The Independence of a Flame
by BlueFlaw
Summary: Natsu lived in the empire of Alvarez as a prince ever since Igneel disappeared. Natsu had always tried to escape the empire to seek adventure, but it was an impossible task, since the Shields of Alvarez were in his way. On one day he does his usual princely chores, he encounters a spy currently on the run. Just one moment, everything changes when the spy accidentally kidnaps Natsu.
1. Desire to be Free

**Aw man! I've always wanted to write an E.N.D fic! Welp, looks like I'm not doing that anytime soon...**

 **It looks like since some manga translators can't make up their mind on some names I'll put this list here.**

 **Azir = Ajeel**

 **Bradman = Bloodman**

 **Invel = Imber**

 **Eileen = Irene**

 **Rahkeid = Larcade**

 **I'm pretty sure those are all the names that have been translated differently by different translators...**

 **I'll be using the translated names from Manga Stream (The names on the left).  
**

 **Uh... Yeah, catch up to the manga if you wanna understand this chapter at all.**

* * *

 **Chapter One**

 **Desire to be Free**

"What? Zeref is out traveling... Again?" A spiky pink haired boy exclaimed in his king sized bed. The sun had just risen up. A blue cat was sitting on top of the bed with a sleepy look. "He didn't even arrive back from his previous travels."

"Aye Natsu. I heard it from one of the shields!"

"Oh no!" the boy named Natsu panicked as he jumped out of his bed and tried to quickly put on his clothes. "Then we have to get out of here, quick."

"Aye sir!" the blue cat smiled with enthusiasm. "But it won't be as easy to escape here as your previous attempt, or your attempt before that. Not like you succeeded on those attempts anyway."

"Arrgh Happy, this time for sure we'll get out!"

"I think I'm getting a déjà vu moment."

When Natsu finally finished changing his clothes, he grabbed his room door knob. He didn't open it. "This magical presence…" Natsu took a deep breath, fake comical tears already streaming down his face. "August is already on to my plan?"

"Looks like our escape plan already failed. Can we go fishing now?" Happy's stomach growled.

Natsu nodded sadly. He opened the door to confront August.

"Good morning…" he yawned.

"Your highness, I assume you know the emperor has gone traveling."

"Yeah…"

"Good, it's time for you to fulfill the emperor's duties in the emperor's place. I hope you are not planning to escape… again."

Natsu nodded and started walking sluggishly, "I'm off… August, do me a favor and tell Brandish to go fishing with Happy later. Happy always seems excited when the she uses her magic on the fish."

"Understood."

Natsu walked through the large halls, each footstep of his landed on the soft cushion of a marvelously patterned red carpet. He sighed again, even though he lived in such luxury and wealth. He could get almost anything and everything, but he was not satisfied.

His brother, Zeref, was the emperor of the huge empire of Alvarez. That made Natsu royalty, a prince, something he never really liked since he was raised in rags by a dragon. In Natsu's early years, Zeref left him in the care of the fire dragon king Igneel where he learned how to use Fire Dragon Slayer Magic. The day Igneel 'suddenly disappeared' in Year x784, Natsu was then reunited with Zeref. Zeref then revealed to Natsu that they were going to live in Alvarez and Zeref was currently the emperor of that kingdom. So basically Natsu lived as a hobo with a dragon and then his life transitioned into being the prince of a great, prosperous empire. He was still not used to the change after all these years.

Natsu's feet had stopped in front of two large doors where Invel was waiting.

"Your Highness," Invel bowed.

Natsu sighed, "I thought I told you to just call me 'Natsu.'"

"I apologize, _your highness,_ " The Winter General smirked.

"Are you trying to get on my nerves?" Natsu sweat dropped.

"No. I was testing your mood. It may very well determine the outcome of this meeting."

"What does that mean?" He asked as he opened the large doors. The scene that lay before him told him everything.

The inside was a hurricane, literally. Just raw magical power flooded out the open windows and doors of the meeting room. The structure of the room itself was already crumbling madly like it was getting disintegrated. The large meeting table was broken and cracked into multiple pieces. It was also insanely dark in the room despite all the open windows in the morning, it was like the sun was hiding from this monstrosity.

This monstrosity? It was just caused by five people. And it seemed like only four of them were intimately fighting, the other one was just sitting there like she had nothing else to do. The two of them who seemed to be one foot away from releasing their magical power were Azir and (God) Serena.

"What? You're having doubts about me joining the shields?" Serena yelled, his arms were firmly down on one of the pieces of the broken table.

"Of course I do! Who wouldn't suspect a man defecting from his own country to join the army of another country? And you joined the ranks of the shields so quickly! Something is definitely fishy!" Azir shouted back.

"Of course I'd get into the ranks of the shields quickly, it's a piece of cake from me who was the strongest wizard in Fiore. Climbing up the ranks in terms of power is easy!" God Serena bragged, a spotlight suddenly flashed on him and he struck a pose.

"I think it's a shame that you were considered number one. Must mean your country is full of weaklings."

"Ha! You think I'd be offended by that? What matters is that I'm the strongest."

"Do you still think you can uphold your title here? We're in Alvarez now!"

"Yeah, you'll get the pleasure of being beat up by Godly me!"

"Is that a challenge I hear? Sweet!" Azir pummeled his fists together, ready for a fight.

At that, Natsu turned away his attention from the two acting like kids. He focused on the other pair fighting. Two girls, Brandish and Dimaria, were verbally abusing each other in their half broken seats.

"Annoying. Quit talking to me," Brandish said in her most lethargic voice.

"You should tell that to yourself, sadist," Dimaria groaned, her eyes full of uninterest.

"Says the one who strips the clothes of every enemy in her path."

"I'm not the one keeping a slave here."

"Annoying."

"Sadist."

"Perv."

"Slaver."

Natsu then averted his eyes to the last member in the room: Eileen. She forked a piece of cake into her mouth. Whether she liked it or disliked it was unknown for her face showed no expression.

And this wasn't even half of the current Spriggans, unless Invel counted.

And Natsu's duty here was to get all these Spriggan under control, meaning: don't let these monsters fight one another. An impossible task for one such as Natsu since he himself liked getting into fights.

It wasn't like the shields couldn't get along, they always play fought like the best of friends. Although, due to certain recent events, the shields have been on the edge lately. One reason being that they're all suspicious of the new member: God Serena. Another reason was that they were getting tired of the countless attempts of Natsu's escapes. The third reason was better left unknown for now.

"Invel, do you think you can handle this?" Natsu whispered as he tried to restrain himself from joining in the fights.

"If it is an order from you, yes. But I am curious, it is rather odd of you to ask me for help."

"I'm not in the mood-"

"Yes but even then, in your bad mood you would destroy the entire room, getting everyone to be quiet. In your good mood, you would 'talk' to them which would usually work. If not, then you would destroy the entire room which would get everyone to be quiet.."

"Yeah, I know. Everyone respects my brother and would hate to see him or his younger brother mad."

"That's not true, we respect you too. But since you're still acting like a child then we have no choice but to treat you like a kid."

"You think I should act more like an adult?"

"I would advise you to do so in these kinds of situations, your highness."

"Knock it off with the 'your highness' already," Natsu muttered.

"Yes _your highness._ "

Natsu sighed again. He had been sighing a lot lately. _What would Zeref do at a time like this?_ He thought hard until he reached a conclusion.

He turned around and walked out of the room, softly closing the doors behind him. Invel followed him.

"What is your plan?"

"We're changing meeting rooms. There's no way we can have an effective meeting in a broken room like that. Tell the others to come if they don't want to deal with me trying to escape. I'm sure they're all sick of acting like my babysitter."

Invel was shocked. "Your highness, is it me or has your attitude changed in the last 10 seconds?"

"Not really. I guess I just realized I had to act like this in order to get out of here." Natsu smiled.

* * *

 **~Five Minutes Later~~~**

The present shields and Natsu had moved to a new room to begin their meeting. Due to the fact the meeting room usually got destroyed, the palace carpenters had decided to build more rooms identical to that of the board room.

"So what's the first issue on the agenda?" Natsu asked.

All eyes shifted to God Serena. If not to make it even more obvious, Azir pointed out the person and called out, "That sweet thing right there."

A few veins showed on Serena's forehead but he took no action. After all, he was in front of the monarch who accepted him.

Right, Natsu needed to figure out how to get Serena to look less suspicious. The shields didn't need to trust him but they did need to accept him as a fellow Shield. This was mainly Natsu's responsibility because he was the first one to give Serena the stamp of approval, which led to Serena becoming one of the shields. But it appeared that Natsu's initial reason for accepting God Serena into Alvarez's army was that Serena had brought a certain mini tree as a peace offering. Natsu was easily amazed at this miniature 'sakura tree.' Its leaves were said to burst into a variety of vibrant colors at a certain time of year. At that, Natsu approved God Serena's request to join the Shields and since Zeref was in a good mood, he allowed Serena's request to come true. And that was the story of how Serena joined the Shields.

However, the other shields were not persuaded easily and no one could blame them. There had been a recent spy in Alvarez trading secret information with Fiore who had yet been able to be identified. The spy wasn't much of a threat but some of the Shields wanted the issue to be dealt with as quickly as possible since the work put on the shields had increased since then. It was reasonable to think Serena was the one responsible since the espionage began just as Serena joined the Shields.

"Any complaints or comments on this issue?" Natsu asked.

"Annoying," Brandish said just before laid her head on the table.

"Uninteresting and not a threat," Dimaria replied with a bored look.

"Untrustworthy," Azir snarled.

"..." Eileen gave no response.

Natsu looked over to Serena who seemed to be oddly confident. "What do you think, Invel?"

"I believe we get defects from other countries all the time. What is making all the Shields uncomfortable is that he was able to join us, in the ranks of Shield, in less than a day." Invel stated.

"Is that it..?" Natsu crossed his arms. Everyone nodded. "Okay then, my decision is that God Serena will undergo a Alvarez's normal training program for all soldiers for one year until he'll be officially declared a Shield. His instructor will be Azir. Is that sufficient for everyone?"

Dimaria and Brandish nodded in agreement for once.

The two boys, however, slammed their fists to the table and stood up, breaking the table in the process.

"Your highness, I think it's sweet that he has to train for a year until he can be an official Shield but you must reconsider his instructor! I can't stand that sh***y man!"

God Serena posed again. "It's fine, throw everything you got at me. I just have to listen to this man blabber for a year, sounds simple."

Eileen suddenly raised her hand, finally participating, "I am okay with your decision, your highness, but you are being too soft on the newbie. I propose a few adjustments to this decision."

"Let's hear it."

"Instead of a normal training program, he should undergo Alvarez's finest, rigorous regime. I believe he must overcome many obstacles and hardships like the rest of us Shields. His instructors will be Azir… and me."

Silence washed over everyone in the room, except God Serena who was somewhat confused to why everyone got silent.

"Sure, sounds interesting." Natsu smiled, with a sweatdrop. Everyone knew this wasn't going to end well. "Serena's training will begin… now."

"What?" Azir was paralyzed about what decision just came to be. "...with Eileen?"

"Let's go," Eileen said as she grabbed God Serena and started dragging him to the nearest exit.

"Right! See you in a year Serena! Good luck!" Natsu cheered.

The three of them, confident or nervous, left the room.

Natsu yawned, "Was that all for today?"

"No. It appears you have a series of paperwork dealing with the economy of this empire to do." Invel placed a few stacks of papers in front of Natsu.

"What happened to the people who usually deal with the economy?"

"They've been fired due to their incompetence."

"Seriously?" he groaned in annoyance.

"Dimaria and I shall handle hiring new economy advisors and officials."

"Okay, do it quick."

Dimaria and Invel left the room. Minutes later, August came by to take Brandish to go fishing with Happy. Natsu took the papers and went to his room.

Natsu didn't look like it or act like it, but he was actually pretty smart. When he trained with Igneel, he only learned on the basics of reading and writing because his sole focus was to get strong. When moving to the empire, Natsu was forced to learn the advanced levels of reading and writing, history, science, politics, and math. He wasn't one to listen to people, but when Zeref threatened that he would have Eileen personally teach him then Natsu actually worked his hardest in his studies. 'Anything but Eileen's teachings!' he would usually think when he was young. After a few years, Natsu became an expert in his studies, not as amazing as Zeref but still great. So it became law that whenever Zeref was busy or wasn't present and the few people in charge of dealing with economy and such were fired, Natsu had to fulfill those roles until they hired new people.

Despite his intellect, Natsu wanted to act dumb and childish for that was really his personality right now.

"Argh!" Natsu grew frustrated with the amount of paperwork he had to do, it was already into night and he still wasn't finished. This was one of the reasons he so badly desired to escape when he learned that Zeref wasn't around.

He laid back on his chair and analyzed his desk. There were a few newspapers stacked on the top right corner of the desk. They were newspapers of a variety of countries, Zeref had always told him to keep track of the news of other countries. On top of the stack was Alvarez. Natsu took the second newspaper in the stack. It was Fiore's news.

Fiore was a country on a continent thousands of miles away across the sea from Alvarez. On the headline was "A FAIRYTAIL COME TRUE!" It talked about a guild who lost its core members seven years ago and had finally made a comeback once its beloved members had returned. It showed how unbelievable it was for the bottom ranked guild to make an astonishing victory to first place in the latest Grand Magic Games. It featured interviews from a few members from Fairy Tail and a few other guilds. "Interesting," Natsu said as he put down the newspaper and went back to work.

The door abruptly opened and there was a loud thud noise. Natsu took no heed to it because he thought it was Happy tired after eating three whale sized fish. But this person who opened the door smelled clean, and Happy usually smelled like dirty fish after a fishing trip and plus Happy was already napping on Natsu's pink, spiky hair. How odd, if it wasn't Happy and if it didn't smell like anyone else from the palace, who could it be…

Natsu turned around and found a man heavily panting and coughing on the floor of his room. He had never seen this man before. Not to mention the man had worn odd clothes and had a foreign scent familiar to that of Serena's. But there was a distinct feature on the man's face that he noticed immediately. Something like a cross hatched scar on the man's left side of the face.

Natsu took notice that this man was extremely terrified but was strangely composed. The man tried to not show fear but was obviously fearing _something_.

Once the man noticed Natsu who was behind him, Natsu said slowly, "Hello? Do-You-Understand-What-I'm-Saying?"

The man exploded in more fear and started sweating bullets. "This magical power… it's insane!" he whispered to himself.

Since Natsu had enhanced hearing due to his dragon slayer abilities, he heard what the man said. "So you do speak my language!" he smiled. But that's strange, the man said something about extreme magical power but Natsu was sure that his current magical power presence right now was at a low stage. Maybe he should conceal more of his magical energy?

"Are you the new guy in charge of the economy? I'm glad, I was just about to use a break!" Natsu smiled, hoping that he decreased his magical presence enough so the man would calm down. "So, what's your name? Oh, sorry, I should introduce myself first. My name is Natsu."

"Natsu?" The man didn't seem to calm down, instead he couldn't even hide the fear in his face anymore. "As in the Prince of Alvarez!?" the man shouted in realization and disbelief.

"Yes, now what's your name?"

"..."

"Hey," Natsu narrowed his eyes and deepened his voice but did not remove his smile. "Could you be that spy that's been lurking around this palace for a while?"

The man stiffened, which meant Natsu was spot on.

"Look-" the man tried to explain but a voice from afar echoed.

"INTRUDER! THERE'S AN INTRUDER IN HIS HIGHNESS' CHAMBERS! INTRUDER!" shouted a maid.

The ground started shaking, magical energy flooded everywhere. Perhaps a nearby volcano was erupting and there was invisible water flooding the palace. Or maybe someone had incurred the wrath of a few Spriggan.

"Damn!" the man cursed loudly as he was preparing to perform some sort of magic.

"Hey wait!" Natsu grabbed the shoulder of the man.

His eyes suddenly couldn't see anything for a split second. The next second he was staring outside of a window, a wide field of bright grass was being tugged by a gentle breeze of wind. He was surprised, he hadn't seen such a long stretch of nature in a long time since he'd always been trapped in an Empire that had pretty much used all its land for industrialization. There was no other explanation for Natsu seeing such a sight other than teleportation or illusion magic. Natsu looked back at the man, Happy still sleeping above him, oblivious to their situation.

When he saw the man, he could only sweat drop and feel guilty for no reason.

For reasons unexplained, the man who had probably teleported them here was shaking in a corner while muttering out the words: "I accidentally kidnapped a prince…"

Natsu tilted his head, "Um… could you tell me your name now? And possibly where we are too?"

The man shakily turned his head to face Natsu. "M- My name is Mest Gryder…

"And w-we're in Fiore," he cried.

Natsu's eyes widened and so did his smirk.

"I'm finally free."

* * *

 **This story was inspired by Chapter 3 of "The What If Analogy" by snakeboy33. I thought I had to shout it out there.**

 **If you liked or disliked this, don't follow this story XD**

 **Um... if you were looking for a fanfiction that is mainly focused on the 12 shields... well you're not going to find much of it here.**

 **The date that Igneel disappeared (or the date they got out of the Eclipse gate) is different because I wanted Natsu to be close to the age of the members of Fairy Tail, because I can't imagine an adult Natsu.**

 **To be continued... whenever I write the next chapter...**


	2. The Outside World

**Chapter Two**

 **The Outside World**

The whole palace was in an uproar. They all just couldn't believe that their prince was just abducted. The maids panicked, the guards were all being lectured or fired one by one. It was one catastrophic night in Alvarez.

It finally happened, Natsu left Alvarez, one way or another.

Invel nervously paced back and forth, one step turned the ground into ice, the other steps created layer after layer on top of the ice.

August was fuming mad. Anyone within a mile radius of him had immediately fainted. Fortunately it was midnight when most people were asleep.

"Calm down," God Serena said. "Wouldn't the prince be strong enough to protect himself against a mere kidnapper? It actually surprises me that he was abducted in the first place. Although if he was in trouble, you can all leave it to godly me."

Brandish leaned over to Serena's ear. "I get that since you're new here you're going to need a little explanation. So I'm just going to tell you this: August and Invel aren't angry because the prince got ' _kidnapped_ '. They're really just bitter because they were careless enough to let the prince escape."

"What?" God Serena looked over to Brandish for more of an explanation but she refused because she was too lazy.

Then Azir decided to answer him. "It was no mystery to anyone that the prince wanted to get out of Alvarez and explore a bit. Unfortunately, Emperor Spriggan had placed strict rules on the prince that prevented him from leaving the capital. However, the prince hardly pays attention to anyone, so he would always try and _escape_ while his brother left on a trip. None of the Shields minded too much because they made the prince promise that for every failed attempt to escape, he would take ten percent of each of the Shield's paperwork. That's a lot of paperwork considering he usually attempts to escape five times a week. That's fifty percent of each of our work gone.

"I think you can understand why August and Invel are the most irritated because they usually got the most work of all the Shields. You should also understand that Emperor Spriggan has strictly ordered us to keep the Prince inside Alvarez. If he found out that the prince left..."

"We might have to open up the warehouses again to put the paperwork in now that the Prince's gone. The papers are going to stack again…" Dimaria sighed.

"Annoying…" Brandish had her head down. She clearly was not happy to be doing all her work again.

"I would have never expected his highness to take advantage of a spy's teleportation skills," Invel admitted while stopping his ice magic from further freezing the ground. "I'll have to commend him for this when he returns."

"So is no one worried about the prince?" Serena tilted his head to understand the matter.

"No," another member of the Shields appeared, Neinhart. "The prince is strong enough to protect himself. Even if he were to die, I could just bring him back with my _Historia_."

"The Emperor wouldn't be happy with that," Dimaria said.

"The chances of the prince dying on his travels are zero percent," Eileen said and smirked. "After all, I personally taught him how to survive."

"Yes we all remember when you buried his highness three miles in the ground for _survival training_ ," Invel sighed.

"That reminds me, I have to continue Serena's training," the Scarlet Despair said as she started digging a hole.

"You're going through with survival training first?" Azir sweat dropped.

"No. I'm going to dump this man into Earthland's core."

"Sweet! Let me help!"

"Godly me… will endure this…" Serena sweat-dropped.

Brandish walked up to August who was still seething with rage. "So, what's going to happen with the country now that the prince and the emperor are out?"

August calmed himself and stared at the ground. "You're right, the country will be leaderless for a while…"

"There's no need to worry about that," Invel cut in. "We shall split the Shields into three groups. Group A: August, Brandish, Neinheart, and DiMaria shall be the group to search for his highness and bring him back. Group B: God Serena shall go under training of Eileen and Azir, as the prince had requested. Group C: The rest of us Shields will stay at Alvarez and maintain order whilst taking the workload of the Shields who will be away."

Brandish tilted her head. "Does that mean…"

"Yes, it means that we all will get a load of work to do."

Brandish collapsed in defeat, "This is so annoying… How are we even going to be able to find the prince anyway?"

"We'll search each country and continent one at a time," August said.

"Told you we should have put a tracker on him," DiMaria bit her lip in irritation.

* * *

 **~Fiore~**

"Um… are you okay?" Natsu asked Mest who was still shivering in fear and possibly having a mental breakdown.

"I...Kidnapped a prince…I'm now a... Criminal… Starter of wars…" Mest kept repeating to himself.

"Did I do something wrong?" Natsu tilted his head in confusion.

"No!" Mest suddenly stood up with a nervous smile. "I'm just dead for accidentally kidnapping you…"

"Why would you die from kidnapping me?"

"If Alvarez ever found out that I, a citizen from Fiore, _abducted_ you, a prince, a war will surely happen. And I'd be the first one to die."

"A war? Why would Alvarez declare war over a silly issue such as kidnapping me?" Natsu laughed. "You're funny."

"Why are you laughing? I need to find a way to somehow get you back-" Mest was cut off by Natsu's sharp voice.

"No, I'm not going back, well not soon anyway."

"What?"

"You can't believe how much I've been yearning to leave the country! And I can assure you that Alvarez will not declare war with Fiore over a simple issue as this."

"Are you serious?" Mest's voice was uneasy.

"Yes."

Mest sighed in relief. "But still, I need to keep an eye on you just in case matters with Alvarez get bad."

"Fine," Natsu smiled like the most innocent person in the world as he caught a glance out the window.

"Good," Mest said, taking Natsu's word for real.

"Okay. But tell me the name of this town."

"We're not in a town. We're in Crocus, the capital of Fiore."

Natsu's smile turned into a devilish grin. Mest looked at Natsu dumbly until Natsu suddenly rushed to Mest and punched him hard to the stomach. The force and power of the punch was nothing Mest had experienced in his whole lifetime, his expression was that of shock and regret before he lost consciousness.

"Wake up Happy, we got some exploring to do!"

"Aye…" Happy said, drowsily.

* * *

"Woah! This is amazing! I've never seen so many tiny contraptions before," Natsu fawned over a toy store. Ishgar sure had a lot of cool little contraptions. The storekeeper was looking at him oddly and wondered why a grown man would act so childish.

"Aye!" Happy cheered.

The shopkeeper then politely said, "I'm going to close shop soon, you should leave now too."

"Why? It's not even high noon yet?" Natsu said while looking at the position of the sun. It was then that he just realized that it was almost high noon and just a few hours ago back in Alvarez it was near midnight. Maybe the time zones were different.

"Don't you know? Today is the celebration of the end of the Grand Magic Games. The king announced that everyone can take the half of the day off to celebrate another year of success and entertainment."

Natsu had yet another confused look on his face. "Woah… Really? That sounds cool."

"You didn't know? Even after all the commotion that's been going on recently? Ah forget that, it's almost time. I'm closing shop and you should go home now boy." The man closed the shutters in his shop.

"A celebration..." Natsu muttered as his stomach growled loudly.

"Look, that meat restaurant just closed, how are we going to eat now?" Happy pointed out as the man operating the meat shop locked down his store and left.

"You're right, I haven't eaten in a day…" Natsu groaned. He hadn't slept in a while either. "Looks like we'll have to go somewhere else, Happy. Let's- What's that?" he pointed dumbly to a pink frog walking in circles in the middle of nowhere.

"It's a frog!" Happy smiled.

"It looks lost… and happy."

Natsu and Happy approached the frog thing that was about the same size as Happy.

"Are you lost?" Happy asked.

The frog thing looked at Happy for a few seconds until it answered, "Fro thinks so…"

"Were you with a friend?"

The frog thing nodded.

Natsu sighed, "I suppose we'll wait here until this friend of yours finds you."

"Aye!"

The frog thing smiled.

"What's your name?" Happy asked.

"Fro!"

And at that moment, Happy and Fro became good friends and started playing tag with each other. Natsu scanned around the area if there were any other food shops open. Unfortunately, it seemed as though all the stores were closed. He clutched his stomach in pain from his starvation. His ears suddenly twitched when he heard a distant yelling.

Two voices were yelling something along the lines of 'Frosch! Where are you?' and 'Yukino!'

Since the Frosch name sounded similar, Natsu guessed that these people may be looking for this pink frog/cat thing. When Natsu called Happy and Fro to follow him, they both sprouted wings from their back and flew to Natsu. There, they each perched on Natsu's shoulders. Happy on the right, Fro on the left.

"Woah Fro you can use _Aera_ too?" Happy gasped in surprise. He thought he was the only cat that could fly.

"Fro thinks so," Fro said in his usual cheery expression.

Natsu smirked as he realized Happy finally had a friend he could somewhat relate too. He walked over to the direction of the two voices.

Once he reached the Capital's plaza, he found two young men around his age yelling around about where this Frosch is. One of them had a muscular build and blonde, spiky hair. The other one was paler and less muscular. His black hair was a bit long and straight. It was sudden when the two turned on each other and started quarrelling. After they punched each other in the face at the same time, they both apologized immediately and laughed.

Natsu approached them quietly and said, "Excuse me?"

The two looked at Natsu with an annoyed look, until their eyes immediately lay on Fro.

"Frosch!" The raven haired man opened his arms up in surprise.

"Rogue!" Fro exclaimed in happiness as he leaped into Rogue's chest.

"I worried so much! Don't ever leave on your own again!" Rogue had a waterfall of tears streaming down from his eyes.

A more furry, reddish brown cat appeared from the blonde's shoulder. "Frosch! Don't ever scare us like that again!"

The blonde smiled as his eyes drifted from Rogue and Fro's reunion to Natsu. "Thanks for finding Frosch, how can we repay you?" he asked as he smiled in gratitude.

"Oh it's nothing," Natsu nervously scratched his head. He had no idea of how he should act around commoners. His whole life he'd spent time around the Shields, the nobles, the royal guard, and Zeref.

Happy whispered to Natsu's ear, "Why not ask them if they have any food?"

Natsu's stomach growled in agreement.

The blonde's gaze immediately darted from Natsu to Happy. "Woah, is that an Exceed?" he pointed at Happy in surprise.

"Aye!" Happy cheered at the name of his species, remembering that that was what Zeref told him.

"Wait so if you're an Exceed, does that mean your friend here is a dragonslayer?"

"Aye!" Happy chirped as Natsu nodded. He dug the lower half of his face in his scarf.

"Woah, I didn't think I'd be meeting so many dragon slayers in one week," he said as he looked at Natsu. "My name is Sting- but you probably already knew that, what's yours?"

Natsu smiled nervously, _was this Sting guy some kind of celebrity or something?_ "My name's Natsu, nice meeting you Mr. Sting." His voice was a bit muffled from the scarf covering his mouth.

Sting sweat-dropped. "There's no need for formalities. Just call me Sting, my Exceed friend is called Lector and my scary friend *points at black haired male* is named Rogue."

"Hey," Rogue smiled as he was clearly grateful that Frosch was back. "Thanks for finding Frosch."

"Uh… No problem," Natsu guessed that those were the words that normal people would say when they were replying to a thank you.

"You mentioned something about food," Sting started. "Maybe we could bring you to the celebration that the King's holding."

"Uh…"

"I'm not taking no for an answer!" Sting smirked as he grabbed Natsu's arm and forced him to follow. Rogue also followed as he put Frosch on his shoulder.

"Off to the Palace we go," Sting smiled.

"Uh…" Natsu wondered if this was how normal people treated each other every day. If that was the case, he sure liked this life more than the life of a prince.

At that moment, each of the Exceeds lifted off from their partner's shoulders and sprouted their wings to fly in the air. Above their respective partner, they each started talking about anything including fish.

"So Sting, are you part of a famous guild or something? Everyone seems to be taking pictures of you guys," Natsu said as he noticed a lot of people, mostly girls, took their cameras out and took pictures of the men. They all squealed and muttered things like 'cute' and 'who's that other guy with them?'

Sting abruptly stopped and turned to face Natsu with a shocked expression. "You don't know who I am? Meaning… You haven't heard of us or anything from the past seven years or past seven days?"

"No?" Natsu sweat-dropped and came up with an excuse for his lack of knowledge. "I've been living under a rock for the past seven years anyway."

Sting smirked. "Well, I'm part of a famous guild. Guess which guild I belong to!"

"Um…" Natsu tapped his head when he recalled the name of a guild that was on Fiore's newspaper. "Fairy Tail?"

A quick groan sounded from Sting as it looked like he was dying inside. He dramatically collapsed on the floor, face first. This caused some of the fan-girls to shriek and protect Sting. Lector noticed and poked Sting carefully.

"What did you do to Sting-sama?!" one of them accused.

"Uh... nothing?"

"Liar! Let's get that man and avenge Sting-sama!" someone, apparently the leader of Sting's fanclub yelled and pointed to Natsu.

Natsu worriedly looked to Rogue for help but Rogue just disappeared into a shadow, literally. A message was written in the shadows: Don't mess with girls.

As someone who had been raised by a dragon and raised as a prince for the majority of his lifetime, he had no idea how to act around girls. There was Brandish, DiMaria, and Eileen, but those monsters hardly acted like _this_. He remembered Zeref's advice, which was: Don't mess with girls, which was basically the same advice Rogue just gave to him. Probably all the men in the world had this same advice about women. He'll have to consult Invel about this woman issue when he gets back.

Natsu immediately ran at the speed of light, away from Sting and all those fangirls that were trying to make an effort to chase and attack him.

He ran through many streets and corners, until he accidentally ran into something hard and cold.

"Ouch!" he exclaimed as he fell back. "Sorry!" He slowly looked up to the person he bumped into and his eyes widened in surprise, and fear. His eyes met the scary stare of a woman who had scarlet hair. Natsu almost yelled 'Eileen?!' but he noticed how this woman in front of him wore armor. Eileen hated the cold steel of armor, she was more like a witch with all the robes and certain type of fabric clothing. Nevertheless, this woman still scared him.

"Are you okay?" she asked as she reached out a hand. There were a lot of bandages covering her body.

Natsu sweat-dropped as he grabbed the hand. _Definitely not Eileen._

He got up to his own two feet with the help of the red-head and noticed she had two other companions with her. Another was a girl with blonde hair. The other was a shirtless man who gave off a similar cold aura to that of Invel's, wait was being shirtless also normal? They both had a lot of bandages on. "Thanks," he said as he heard the voices of the women that were previously chasing him.

Shivers crawled up his skin as he no longer liked the idea of hanging around women. He was about to make a run for it, but he remembered that he left Happy with that weird Sting character. He was now conflicted.

Just as he was about to make a run for it, the red haired girl's voiced suddenly popped up. "Hey, are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," he answered casually and bit his lip. "It's just that Sting's fan club is out to kill me."

"You know Sting? Are you part of Sabertooth? Do you know where Yukino is?" the redhead bombarded him with questions that Natsu did not know the answers to.

"No I only just met the man just now. I kind of regret it now… What's a Sabertooth? You mean that extinct animal, right? And I don't know any Yukino..."

The trio looked at him with puzzled looks. They were giving off that _were-you-living-under-a-rock-for-the-past-seven-days_ look.

Natsu didn't pay too much attention to their reaction as the angry mob of Sting fans came into view. Still having no idea how to deal with girls, he instinctively hid behind a person slightly larger than his size, aka the shirtless man. Fortunately, the mob ran by without noticing Natsu was hiding and after a few seconds, he was in the clear.

He sighed in relief which earned him a few curious looks from the group. "What? Isn't it normal to be chased by random mobs of girls?" Natsu was serious, he didn't know if something so ridiculous was normal for the commoners.

The blonde awkwardly answered, "No… It isn't."

Now that the blonde got his attention, Natsu noticed the the girl looked awfully familiar. Before he even thought it, a question rolled off his tongue. "Hey… Is it possible that you're a Heartfilia?" After realizing what he just said, he clasped his mouth.

Suddenly, a sword was held against his throat by the redhead. "Is this normal too?" he asked, it may take him a while to fully grasp the true life a normal person.

The redhead looked a bit surprised that he didn't find a 'sword to throat' as a threat…

"Erza, stop," the blonde sweat-dropped. She then looked to Natsu. "I'm sorry, that last name usually brings bad luck… How did you know?"

The redhead, who the blonde called Erza, lowered her sword.

"I don't know, you look a lot like Ann— I mean your mom, um…" Natsu quickly realized how odd his answer was. He was pretty sure that no one nowadays had knowledge on four-hundred year prominent figures. To correct it, he corrected 'Anna' to 'your mom' because he guessed that the mother of this girl probably looked similar. But he probably never met this girl's mother which made it all the more weird and awkward.

They all looked at him with befuddled looks.

"Oh sorry, I lied. I just —uh— have the ability to figure out someone's surname," Natsu was sweating bullets. He wanted to leave Alvarez to explore, not make a complete fool of himself.

"Oh really," Erza crossed her arms and sighed. "Then what's my surname?"

Considering the fact that this girl looked a lot like Eileen, Natsu blurted out, "Belserion."

Erza was quiet for a second which caused Natsu to be surprised. Eileen never told him that she had relatives in other countries, or maybe he was too disorientated from her 'training regime' to pay attention. The shirtless man perked up in interest.

Then Erza made an 'X' with her arms. "Wrong!"

Realizing that he was now going to explain why he knew the blonde's surname was Heartfilia, Natsu made a run for it. He was sure he could outrun whoever these people were since he's spent a lot of his lifetime running away from monsters like August and Eileen.

But he did not account for running into a moving object along the way. In the midst of his flee, he accidentally tripped over something that looked a lot like a pumpkin that was moving. Having never seen a moving pumpkin before, he just assumed that he ran into a normal pumpkin. Instead, there was _someone_ inside of the pumpkin and it looked like Natsu just accidentally kicked the living daylights out of him. Natsu immediately apologized but he knew the now unconscious man could not hear him.

Suddenly, a large number of people that dressed up like guards suddenly surrounded him and started accusing him of 'attempt of murder'.

Natsu, completely confused at his situation did nothing as the guards picked him up and cuffed him with some sort of weird cuffs.

"You are under arrest for assaulting the king of Fiore," one of the guards said as he pushed him towards the direction of some sort of palace in the horizon. Natsu wondered if the small pumpkin he just tripped over was their king. If it was… then the outside world is a really strange place...

While he was being dragged to wherever, Natsu caught a glimpse of the trio he had just met. Their wide expressions showed that they were just as confused as he was.

* * *

When Natsu was thrown into a cell that was pretty deep in the palace, he couldn't help but regret leaving Alvarez. As boring as being a prince was, nothing was more depressing than being thrown in jail with no idea why. He was actually kind of hopeful that August would just suddenly burst in and destroy everything and take him back home. Or maybe that Mest guy could teleport in and apologize for everything for no reason like he did before and teleport him back to Alvarez. Of course, there was always the option of burning down the whole palace with his own magic and returning back home, but he wasn't exactly the type to 'show off'.

Then he realized what these strange cuffs were. They were magic restraining cuffs, an interesting contraption that didn't necessarily exist back in Alvarez. These things were probably useless to a demon who had curse power.

Natsu sighed as he casually melted off the restraints for they were uncomfortable and unnecessary. He then laid back and hoped that he would be acquitted for this misunderstanding. As a prince, he would respect other countries' laws, he just hoped that he would not be forgotten and left to rot here for all eternity. If that happened, he would lose all respect he had for this country.

Then he wondered what the hell Happy was doing with his life. Probably eating fish or complaining about having no fish. Hopefully his feline friend stuck with Sting and Rogue…

The dragon-slayer laid back on the cement floor. He stared at the plain old ceiling that reminded him a lot like the one in his room.

"I'm not free…" he whistled.

* * *

 **Yeah, sorry for a really long wait... Thing is, I had no idea where I was going with when I wrote this. Chapter One just came in a spur of a moment. Chapter Two required me to actually think hard and plan... which I'm still in the process of doing in future chapters XD**

 **As you can see... I don't really have a plot so this will just be a ride of comedy until I actually figure out what to do. Any ideas are welcomed because I'm stumped. But I could very well make this a two chapter story because the ending of this chapter is the complete opposite of the ending of the first chapter and I like opposite beginning and endings :P Oh well, this author talked to much... Don't worry, I'll keep continuing, just give me another month or two to think :3  
**

 **Thank you for your reviews, I hope this chapter satisfied you because I rewrote it like three times... So much work XD**

 **Thanks for Reading!**

 **To be continued next chapter! (Whenever that'll comes out)**

 **Feel free to review :3**


	3. Looking for Natsu

**Merry Belated Christmas. The only gift I could afford for you guys was this super short and unedited chapter. And no, no one can get a receipt for return :P**

 **Oh, and I'm so sorry for giving a short chapter. But I decided that the next chapter "may" be complicated and long and yeah... More excuses XD (I bet the next chapter is short too XD)  
**

 **Thanks to Warmachine375, I have to change the Spriggan names...**

 **1\. Ajeel Ramal**  
 **2\. August**  
 **3\. Invel Yura**  
 **4\. Irene Belserion**  
 **5\. Bradman**  
 **6\. Wahl Icht**  
 **7\. Neinhart**  
 **8\. Larcade Dragneel**  
 **9\. God Serena**  
 **10\. Brandish Myu**  
 **11\. Dimaria Yesta**  
 **12\. Jacob Lessio**

 **These better be accurate because I'm too lazy to change their names again XD**

 **Hopefully this chapter is enough to satisfy or dissatisfy you. :P My writing and imagination skills are a bit rusty right now. :3  
**

* * *

 **Chapter Three**

 **Looking for Natsu**

 **~Alvarez | Palace~~~**

"...Natsu-san is… gone?" a spiky light, blonde haired man whispered as he held boxes filled with papers in the royal hall of the palace.

"Yes…" Invel replied, as he stared nonchalantly at Larcade's blank face.

Larcade immediately dropped the boxes to the floor, spilling all the papers everywhere.

"Who... Who 'kidnapped' him?" Larcade face was still frozen from shock.

"We don't know yet," Invel glanced at the papers on the quartz tile floor.

"I have to go!" Larcade muttered as he started to turn around and run to pack his stuff but Invel stopped him.

"And where do you think you're going?" Invel gritted his teeth as he tried to slightly freeze Larcades joints so the boy couldn't run away at the speed of light.

"I'm going to find Natsu. Do you know what hell would be unleashed if Father found out that Natsu left?" Larcade exclaimed as he struggled to get away from Invel's magic.

"No, you are staying here. The other Shields are enough to find him," Invel sighed as he adjusted his glasses.

"Let me go!"

"No, you have responsibilities!"

"Don't talk to me like I'm the prince!"

"You technically are one too!"

As the Winter General and the White Dragneel were arguing in calm voices, Neinhart and Bradman were standing a few feet away in the hall, sweat-dropping.

"Aren't thee did suppose to beest with the oth'r group searching f'r the prince?" Bradman asked Neinhart.

"Apparently I was taking too long to put on my armor so they left without me…" Neinhart sighed.

"I toldeth thee yond thee shouldst has't did get diff'rent armeth'r. How about next timeth i wend to the apparel and armeth'r shopeth with thee."

The two nodded, as they continued to watch the other two bicker.

It was odd, how the two seemingly calmest people of the Spriggans were in a fight.

"Want to get popcorn?" Neinhart asked.

 **(Translations for Bradman's Speech all the way down in Author's note) :)  
**

* * *

 **~Fiore | The Capital ~~~**

"Natsuuuuuuuuu! Natsu!" Happy called out as he flew around the air of Crocus. It had been an hour since he last saw his best friend so Happy finally got worried. Since this was a new country, Natsu could've gotten lost, or arrested, or… _WHAT IF HE WAS EATING FISH WITHOUT ME!_ Happy screamed internally.

He then spotted two other Exceeds and decided to ask them if they saw Natsu. Happy smiled, there were so many Exceeds on this other continent.

"HEY!" Happy yelled out to the Exceeds and landed right next to them on the ground. One of them was a female cat and hat snow white fur, and the other looked like a black panther. When his eyes landed on the female cat, Happy knew… it was love at first sight.

The two Exceeds looked at Happy awkwardly as Happy was rummaging through his green backpack, looking for a fish. Happy finally grabbed a hold of his last fish in his bag and knelt down before the cat. He looked up to her with sparkling eyes.

"Would you… care to have this fish?" Happy drooled a bit in awe.

The panther-like Exceed sweat-dropped and turned to the female cat. "Do you know him?"

The female cat shook her head. She then looked at Happy. "Who are you?"

"I'm Happy!" Happy yelled in joy.

"I asked for a name, not your feelings!" the cat grabbed the fish and slapped Happy with it.

"My name is Happy!" Happy smiled as he got slapped in the face with a fish. He either seemed like he was in dreamland, or was a masochist. Happy quickly recovered and stared at the cat in a dream-like state.

The female cat couldn't look any more weirded out.

Happy finally snapped out of his lovey dovey senses when a blue haired girl approached them.

"Oh, Carla, what new friend have you made?" the girl with blue twintails wondered.

"Wendy… Meet Happy, he's not my friend…" Carla sweat-dropped as she was trying to figure out how to deal with this male cat.

"Lily!" A black haired, tanned man, from behind Wendy, shouted "There you are!"

The black panther Exceed, Lily, smiled at the man. "Gajeel! We've just been watching the fight in the colosseum. Apparently Blue Pegasus is battling Lamia Scale. They made a bet that whoever wins gets or keeps third place prize."

"What? They didn't even invite me?" Gajeel exclaimed.

"You're not even part of their guilds. Plus the fight's ending soon because the Celebration's going to start soon," Carla sighed.

Happy's ears twitched up when heard 'Celebration'... He forgot about Natsu! He immediately asked them, "Have any of you seen my friend? He has pink spiky hair!"

Wendy and Gajeel looked at each other in confusion.

"No, we haven't seen your friend," Wendy said.

Gajeel grinned as he pummeled his fists together. "Is this friend of yours strong?"

"He's very strong! But I can't find him…" Happy's eyes started to water as he thought, _Who's going to buy me fish to give to Carla?_

Wendy looked at Happy with sympathetic eyes. "Don't worry, we'll help you find him."

At that, Happy's eyes immediately dried and he faced Carla. "Would you like another fish?" Happy said, trying to sound all slick and cool.

Carla just responded with a sigh, "We might not make it to the banquet if we do this…"

"That's fine. What matters most is that we get him to find his friend," Wendy smiled.

"Oh f***, I have to perform at the Celebration and show everyone my amazing singing!" Gajeel smirked and ran off, earning a sweat-drop from Lily, who decided to follow his dragon-slayer friend.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Crocus~~~**

His stomach was throbbing really hard after the prince of Alvarez had punched him so hard. Good thing he didn't eat any dinner or else he would be throwing up everywhere.

Mest walked in the streets of Crocus, thinking up a plan to find and get the prince to Alvarez. Suddenly, a familiar Head Captain of Custody Enforcement Unit appeared before him.

"Lahar!" Mest gasped in surprise. He sweated, wondering if the council already knew his failure at Alvarez.

"Duran- ***cough*** Mest? What brings you here? I thought you were in Alakitasia for a mission?"

"Oh that?" Mest smiled nervously and scratched his head. "I was visiting here for the Grand Magic Games, then I missed the ship that goes to Alakitasia."

"Oh is that so? I thought you had teleportation magic though…"

"I prefer to ride on the fancy cruises when I cross the sea to another continent…" Mest sweated even more.

"Aren't you broke?"

Mest started to fake laugh really horribly. "I saved up enough coupons to get a free trip!"

"But it doesn't work like that…" Lahar, noticing how weird Mest was acting, decided to let it go. Perhaps because the Mest's mission was so top secret that Mest couldn't reveal anything. "Okay… then, good luck."

Lahar patted Mest's back and left.

Mest closed his eyes deeply sighed in relief. He opened his eyes to see a blur of a familiar blue color. He rubbed his eyes to find the prince's blue cat. There was hope! Maybe he could really return the prince back to his kingdom without a war starting. He wore a deep grin as he started to slowly approach the blue cat.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Crocus~~~**

As Wendy, Carla, and Happy continued the search of Happy's friend, Happy suddenly felt a hand grab him from around the stomach. Happy screamed as he saw who grabbed him. It was a man, with a scar on his face, with evil looking eyes and evil looking everything. It was an evil man— at least, according to Happy.

"Hehehe… Found you!" the man hummed, or as Happy would say 'he hummed an evil hum'.

"Mest, what are you doing?" Wendy questioned as she saw him squeezing Happy with his hand.

"Oh, uh, Wendy, um…" Mest quickly started petting Happy on the head. "I just got the urge to pet him because he's just so soft *pets Happy in a way uncomfortable with Happy*"

Wendy and Carla looked at Mest with a weird look, but decided it was normal since they did witness him eat flowers before.

"Can I keep him?" Mest asked, as if he was a child.

Wendy sweat-dropped."No, we're currently looking for his friend…"

"I can go look for his friend for you! Don't you have a Celebration to attend to anyway?"

Happy was about to argue but Mest covered his mouth.

Carla crossed her arms and agreed with Mest. Wendy was uncertain, as she really wanted to help the blue Exceed, but Carla's stare was convincing her to go to the Celebration.

Wendy lowered her head in defeat. "Fine, I'll go to the Celebration. Mest, I hope you bring him to his friend."

Mest nodded with determination, "I will!"

As soon as Wendy and Carla were out of range- normal and dragonslayer hearing range, Mest turned to Happy and glared at him. "Now time to find the prince and return you both to Alvarez…"

* * *

 **Bradman's Shakespeare Speech Translation:**

 **"Aren't you supposed to be with the other group searching for the prince?" and "I told you that you should have gotten different armor. How about next time, I go to the Apparel and Armor shop with you" Yeah, I don't speak Shakespearean either. If you guys haven't noticed, I think Bradman has some amazing clothing choices... Neinhart... not so much.**

* * *

 **You may or may not see more frequent updates. (I'm pretty sure I said that last time XD~~ Two months later...)**

 **I feel so bad XD I didn't mean to make Mest seem like a villain XD And yes, Mest is complete bonkers because of the stress of kidnapping a prince. And Happy is acting extremely scared of Mest because he was basically asleep throughout the whole 'kidnapping'.**

* * *

 **Props to Warmachine375 and TANNtrum for reminding me that I have a fanfiction to write XD I guess it really has been too long.**

 **toy2jzgte** **asked me to do a qna I think? I think qna means question and answer. I don't know if it means I ask the questions and you answer... or you ask the questions and I answer?**

 **If it's me asking the question then... Do any of you know how old Larcade is? I think it'd be cool if Natsu and Larcade were best friends, but I'm not sure, can't Uncle and nephew be best of friends?  
**

 **If it's you guys asking questions... then ask away. Though I don't think anyone would have questions... unless it's about _that_ plothole. Oh well, I'll probably figure something out.**

 **Thank you for reading**

 **To be continued...**

 **I hope you enjoyed :3**

 **And Thank you everyone for the wonderful reviews! :D**

 **If there's any particular interaction between characters you want to see, just tell me. There are so many interesting interactions that could happen between Fiore's people and the Spriggans...  
**


	4. Not a Criminal

**Wow, this is a long chapter. Oh wait never mind, it's just a chapter with mini chapters added to it.**

 **Mini chapters are chapters with information about how the Shields are doing. May include foreshadowing, clues on a mystery of this AU, and how Natsu impacted their lives.**

 **WARNING: THERE IS A LOT OF INFORMATION IN THIS CHAPTER. (Try not to get confused XD)**

* * *

 **Chapter Four**

 **Not a Criminal**

 **~Fiore | Prison Chambers~~~**

After a few minutes of staring at the ceiling of his empty cell, Natsu did not expect the ground beneath him to suddenly crumble and sink into the ground like quicksand. Natsu, being the lazy ass he was, didn't move from the spot as he thought wherever this sinkhole led to couldn't be any worse than Irene's 'special training'. He couldn't help but wonder what the Shields were doing in Alvarez. They were probably panicking or doing the same as usual or perhaps both.

He sank in the hole out of his own volition and it only took about two minutes for him to catch fresh air again. The ground seemed to disappear for a brief moment as he found himself falling freely for about another minute until he felt his back crash into a rocky ground. After groaning for how he regretted doing nothing when he fell, he noticed the area he fell into was a lot like a cavern. There was a sign that read: "Welcome to the Capital of Death, the Abyss Palace"

Natsu wondered how such a dark name of a place could sound so welcoming. Even the letters were written with blood, how nice.

He suddenly heard a voice. "Who's there?" some voice that sounded like an old man shouted.

Natsu turned his head to find three people approaching him. A pumpkin man, one that looked almost exactly like the pumpkin man he kicked and got arrested for kicking, and a girl around his age.

"Another criminal, apparently," the girl with emerald green hair gasped. "A scary one too, maybe we should keep our distance."

"You know I can hear you," Natsu growled which caused frightened looks from the two. Ignoring their fear, Natsu asked, "What is this place."

The pumpkin man reluctantly answered, "You're in the Capital of Death, the place where the most dangerous criminals get placed to get executed."

"Really? What did you do?" Natsu wondered.

"As if we would tell a criminal like you," the green haired girl hissed.

"Aren't you a criminal too? Since you're down here in a place where all criminals go into?"

"We're not criminals!" the green haired girl shouted in annoyance.

"Then what are you?" Natsu asked, the quickly turned his gaze to where a murderous aura suddenly appeared. There, he saw a man standing, with murderous intent radiating off of him.

The others noticed the presence of this man and started sweating bullets. "Run!" the pumpkin man yelled to his female companion but it was no use as they were all surrounded by the man and four other people.

"I am the Garou Knight, Kama. I suggest you stay still so your death will be painless," the man wore an intimidating mask and his purple shaved hair barely showed underneath his hood.

Natsu looked around and analyzed the type of people around them. "So you're here to kill us?"

"Any criminal who ends up here is sentenced to death. We are executioners who kill all criminals that end up here where there is no hope for them."

"Like I told you, we're not criminals!" the green haired girl yelled.

"Shut up, impersonator," one of the Garou knights cackled.

"No, you should shut your mouth! I am princess Hisui and I order you to stand down!" the now self-proclaimed princess yelled.

"As if we hadn't heard that a hundred times before," one of the female executioners chuckled as she held up a few pieces of paper.

Kama drew his double scythes out and positioned them in a way like he was the dual wielding grim reaper. The other four also readied their weapons and magic to prepare to attack. "Life is short, repent for your sins."

The pumpkin head and Hisui cowered and covered their eyes as they prepared to die.

Natsu was about to give these executioners a taste of his own magic, but then he realized he shouldn't get into more trouble by beating the crap out of officials of a kingdom that is not his. As much as he loved fighting and was itching for a nice fight in this new environment, Natsu restrained himself from engulfing everyone in a simple attack like Fire Dragon's Roar. Instead, Natsu grabbed Hisui and the man in the pumpkin costume and quickly leaped high up into the air as the Garou knights executed their attacks.

The pumpkin man and Hisui both screamed in fear as they didn't expect to be carried by this strange new man they just met into such a great distance into the air. Natsu jumped high enough to reach a stalagmite, then he tried to shush the pumpkin and self-proclaimed princess from screaming any further while group hugging them and a stalagmite.

Natsu looked down below to the ground to see the area the Garou Knights surrounded suddenly explode with green colored slips of papers, purple acid, and venus flytraps. Natsu thought the ground started trembling because of all the combined magic attacks used by the Garou Knights, but he noticed how the heat of the ground was starting to heat up. The ground then cracked to reveal a pool of lava rising up. The fire dragon-slayer wondered what lava would taste like.

The Garou knights seemed to think they finally done the job and completely annihilated the three people they surrounded and used their combined attacks to finish. They were actually fooled, as Natsu saw them disperse with satisfied looks.

With his enhanced hearing, Natsu dropped down from the Stalagmite when the footsteps of the Garou Knights seemed to be far away, and when the ground beneath them suddenly returned back to normal. However, he forgot to warn the pumpkin man and the princess that he was going to return to the ground, so when he let go of the Stalagmite and fell, the two started screaming like it was going to be the end of their life.

As the screams echoed through the cavern of the Abyss Palace, the five Garou knights immediately appeared at Natsu's location again.

"So you somehow escaped that attack…" Kama said with no expression shown. The Garou Knights smiled with interest and started to prepare their attacks.

Natsu sweat-dropped and let go of Hisui and the pumpkin man. He guessed that maybe he could beat the crap out of these executioners with the excuse of self-defense.

Natsu smirked as he spun around and yelled, " **Fire Dragon's Roar!** " as a fire blew out of his mouth and engulfed all the Garou knights and negated their magic attacks. It also, unfortunately, caught the short man's pumpkin costume on fire.

"HOT!" the pumpkin man screamed and tried to pat out the flames.

"Dragon-slayer magic?" Hisui gasped in surprise.

The fires from his magic attack immediately died down to reveal four of the Garou knights charred, and fainted the floor.

Natsu sighed in disappointment as this fight appeared to be a bit too underwhelming. Kama, however, was the only one who seemed to be untouched by Natsu's magic.

Kama's eyes were wide with surprise for a brief moment. "Interesting. For a criminal in the Abyss Palace, you seem to be significantly stronger than the rest. I'm surprised the guards were able to catch you."

"So you acknowledge the weakness of your own kingdom's guards. This country really is weird," Natsu laughed as he coughed out a little bit of fire.

Kama narrowed his eyes and charged into Natsu. Natsu engulfed his fist in flame as he waited for the right moment to strike. As soon as Kama's scythes were in range, Natsu threw his flaming punch towards the scythe, but the flames surrounding his fist suddenly disappeared.

"These scythes negate magic, now prepare to d—" Kama stopped in sentence as Natsu punched through the blade of the scythe, cracking apart the scythe as a whole. Natsu then lunged and punched Kama in the chest which blew the executioner hundreds of meters away. His scythes dropped to the ground, all broken into little shards of metal.

Pumpkin head and the two girls had their eyes bulging out and mouths gaping wide as they could hear the echo of Kama's crash throughout the whole cavern.

"Wha—"

Natsu looked at his fist to find a cut similar to a paper cut from him punching the scythe with just his bare fists. "Ouch…"

The pumpkin man —with his pumpkin costume thing slightly burnt— approached Natsu. "Who are you really? There's no way those idiots for guards could capture some one as strong as you."

Natsu sweat-dropped. "Alright, apparently I'm guilty for accidentally kicking a pumpkin that looks a lot like the pumpkin costume you're wearing."

The pumpkin man somehow looked like he understood what Natsu meant by 'kicking a pumpkin'.

"So is that it? Are those the only executioners here?" Natsu asked as he saw nothing but rocks and sand everywhere. "How do I get out?"

"You have to find a gigantic door. It leads outside to the basement of the palace," the pumpkin man told Natsu with uncertainty.

"Oh, really?" Natsu crossed his arms behind his head as he started walking forward. He quickly noticed that the others were following him. He didn't ask them why, he figured that they're staying near him just in case an executioner regains consciousness and attacks them again or something like that.

He glanced behind himself, where pumpkin man and the girl was following him. They were startled when he asked, "So what's the situation here? So are you criminals?" He glanced at the green haired girl. "Are you self-proclaimed royalty of the criminals or something?"

The self-proclaimed princess almost smacked Natsu in the face, "Of course we're not!" she yelled, but the dragonslayer smirked and dodged.

"Then what are you?"

The two were silent.

"No reply then? That's okay."

"The royal family had been framed and impersonated," the pumpkin man spoke, to Hisui's surprise.

"Father! What do you think you're telling this man? You can't trust him" the green haired girl questioned the white haired girl's actions.

"This guy is strong, maybe he can help us," Hisui's father said.

Sweat was visible from the green haired girl as she looked at Natsu and decided whether she should trust him or not. She looked at man in the pumpkin costume and hesitantly nodded.

"The daughter of the royal family made a deal with a certain man and if certain conditions were met, the princess would allow the man to use the Eclipse gate."

Natsu got really interested when she mentioned the Eclipse Gate.

"The man told the princess that he was going to use the Eclipse Gate to go back in time to kill the Black Wizard Zeref back when he was not immortal."

The dragon-slayer flinched. He wondered why anyone would ever want to kill his brother. _And what is the nonsense about this nickname 'Black Wizard'? Well… Zeref does always wear black, and he is a wizard..._

"But the man lied. The princess soon found out that the man had different intentions with the Eclipse gate and tried to stop him. The man was, however, very strong, so he dumped her into Abyss Palace. The man was also somehow able to throw the king to the Abyss Palace and impersonate the king to manage all the preparations for Eclipse at the above. It's been a month now since the king and princess have been stuck in Abyss Palace, running from their executioner's each day until they can find a way to escape."

"So that's why I arrested for kicking that pumpkin. The guards thought I assaulted their king!" Natsu realized and then his thoughts shifted to wondering what Zeref would look like in a pumpkin costume. "Doesn't explain how the pumpkin and princess survived for a month if they easily got surrounded by the executioners when I arrived."

"Hey!" The green haired girl growled but Natsu ignored her.

Natsu narrowed his eyes. _So that's the whole story that's going on… everything's making a little more sense._

He suddenly caught a whiff of some fresh air. He turned his head to face a giant cavern wall to notice that the giant door was camouflaged to meet the same color of the cavern wall.

"Is that the exit?" he asked and pointed to the door that so easily blended with its surroundings.

The pumpkin man noticed and yelled. "Hisui! That door leads to the exit! Get out there and tell everyone what's happening before it's too late!"

The princess nodded and quickly ran to the door and exited.

The pumpkin man looked at Natsu for a second, wondering if he could trust this boy with the information he had. This pink haired man didn't seem all too bad. After a few seconds, he decided to ask Natsu for a favor. "Could you take this helmet off of me please? I can't see well in this helmet in the dark, but it's stuck."

Natsu nodded, and burnt the helmet into ashes into an instant, to the man in the pumpkin costume's surprise. It was revealed that an old man was wearing the pumpkin helmet. He seemed a bit old… a bit too old to have a daughter as young as Hisui, Natsu thought. He also realized that this man looked oddly familiar.

"I am Toma E. Fiore, also known as the king who rules over the kingdom of Fiore," the old man introduced himself as he narrowed his eyes to get a clear look at this pink haired man's face.

The clear image of Natsu immediately clicked in the king's mind.

Then the king's eyes popped out.

His jaw dropped down to the ground.

His heart stopped for five seconds.

His face was absolutely frozen.

He probably realized Natsu was a Prince.

The Prince of Alvarez.

The Kingdom that Could Potentially

Destroy

Fiore.

All of Fiore.

And Probably More.

And this Prince

Was in the Capital of Death.

The Capital of Death of _his_ kingdom.

Why.

"WHAT ON EARTHLAND!? YOU'RE— Y— YOU— OH MY GOD!"

Natsu covered his ears in terror, this old man's screaming was deadly, more deadly than when Irene accidentally walked in on August in the bathroom— and that was literally deadly. The nonstop bloody fighting over locking the door or knocking on the door… To think two of the most oldest and mature of the Spriggans would have a fight over such stuff. Natsu shivered at such a horrifying memory.

The king rapidly took in breaths as he couldn't get this horrible feeling of shock and surprise out of his system. By this time he should've gotten a heart attack.

After ten minutes, the king's breathing was finally somewhat normal. "Y-young man… can I see your right shoulder, please?" he asked, as if he wanted to clarify something.

Natsu complied to the king's request as he remembered why Toma, the king of Fiore looked so familiar. A few years ago, the king had visited Alvarez to discuss some trade issues with some of the Shields while Zeref was away. Natsu remembered that he barged into the conference room with Larcade, demanding for food because the other Shields had apparently destroyed their food storage.

Natsu rolled up his sleeve to reveal a red mark of Alvarez's royal crest on his right shoulder. He cringed, as he predicted a loud scream.

"THE PRINCE OF ALVAREZ?! — *deep breath*

"WHAT ON EARTHLAND AND GATES OF HELL IS THE PRINCE OF ALVAREZ DOING IN THE _C_ APITAL OF DEATH IN MY KINGDOM!? — *deep breath*

"WHAT DO THOSE IDIOTIC GUARDS OF MINE THINK THEY'RE DOING?! — *deep breath*

"MY COUNTRY IS DOOMED!" The king finally finished screaming but voice rang and echoed many times throughout the cavern, almost rupturing Natsu's eardrums. Soon after, the king's voice finally died, and the king finally fainted, Natsu assumed from a heart attack.

Natsu sweat-dropped as he muttered to himself, "Congratulations, Fiore, you have beat Mest in the record panicking yourself to death…"

He sighed and picked up the king, in bridle style, and walked to the giant door with a long flight of stairs behind it.

Natsu stopped before he exited the Abyss Palace. He looked down at Fiore and realized that things could get a bit problematic if he accidentally killed the king by giving him a massive heart attack… _Oh… this could be bad..._

* * *

 **Mini Chapter 1**

 **Mystery of the Once Cruel Ruler**

 **~Pergrande Kingdom~~~**

The buildings were tall, decorated with all sorts of stained glass and plants. The streets were buzzing with many people and their magic-fueled vehicles. The grounds were illuminated with light lacrimas that glowed in the night of the city. There were balloons tied to the ground. Many stands were open and selling the public all sorts of goods.

"It seems like many countries in Ishgar are holding celebrations or holidays this week. Some celebrations are either a yearly tradition or some are held in honor of the eclipse," August said, as he took a map from a pile of maps sitting on a table next to an ice cream stand.

"There's so many people smiling like happy idiots. And so many girls. Maybe I should strip them," Dimaria chuckled.

"I wonder what desserts they have," Brandish wondered.

August, Dimaria, and Brandish were standing in the center of Pergrande Kingdom's central plaza. August held up the map of Earthland and pointed to their current location.

"So the plan is: We start here at Pergrande Kingdom and search everywhere. Then we walk to Sin, then sail to Enca, then sail to Midi, then walk to Minstrel, then to Joya, then to Desierto, to Bellum, Iceberg, Stella, Bosco, Seven, Fiore, then finally Caelum. At least, until we find his highness," August said as he pointed to each country and Kingdom.

Brandish's eyes twitched as she realized how much work this really was. She thought that August would just cast a search magic, but apparently the old geezer didn't bother to learn universal search magic. He only learned search magic within an approximate radius of Alvarez and that's how he keeps track of Natsu in Alvarez,

Dimaria's eyes also twitched. "How come Alakitasia isn't on this map?" she asked.

August ignored her as he continued to explain the plan. "Plan A is all three of us will split up and each of us will search a third of this kingdom. This may take a couple of days. Plan B is we speak to the rulers and seek aid in our search"

Brandish scoffed, "Yeah right. These rulers are too arrogant and selfish to lend us help, even if they knew we were the Shields of Alvarez."

"I say we do Plan A," Dimaria nodded.

The other two agreed. August smiled for a second, noticing that the two girls who always fight just agreed to something without glaring daggers at each other. He turned away to hide this smile, and he went his own way to search for Natsu.

Brandish was also about to go her own way to first find if this country had star mango gelato but Dimaria blocked her path.

"Randi," she said. "Let's have a private chat first before we proceed with the plan."

"But my star mango gelato is waiting for me," Brandish complained.

"There are none on this continent," Dimaria snapped and facepalmed.

Brandish stared at her rival with a sulky face. "Fine, I guess I'll talk with you while I look for something good to eat…"

Dimaria sighed. She first looked around her surroundings to see if August was near. Once the coast was clear, Dimaria asked, "Did you know that the Emperor intends to have Natsu kill him and die with him?"

"Yeah, I'm fully aware of that. August told me a long time ago," Brandish said as she put a spoonful of star mango gelatin (that came out of seemingly nowhere) in her mouth and blushed. "Yum."

"How come I'm the only one who didn't know this? Aren't I an old Shield here?"

"Only until you reach the age of August or Irene," Brandish snickered.

Dimaria sighed. She stared at the bowl of star mango gelatin. The country demolisher quickly hid the dessert behind her back. The time mage quickly complained, "Can't you just enlarge the dessert to a bigger size so we can share?"

"No, this is mine, and mine alone!" Brandish hissed as she turned around and ate more of the dessert with her back facing her rival.

Dimaria's stomach growled as she started to get back on topic. "So what do you think about that situation?"

"It's my star mango gelato!" Brandish hissed again.

"Not that part!" Dimaria was tempted to freeze time and eat the dessert in front of Brandish in stopped time.

Brandish turned around to face her, with chubby cheeks and an empty bowl in her hands.

"I think you don't need to worry about the Emperor and Natsu," the size-shifter mage answered. "Before Natsu was introduced to the the palace, August once told me that the Emperor had a brother that he wanted to use to kill himself. August said that the Emperor planned to have Natsu grow up with powerful mages in a separate continent. That was the Emperor's _first_ intention. But then, his plan obviously changed when one day, the Emperor introduced Natsu as his brother to the kingdom."

"So since the Emperor's plan changed, then his intention has probably changed too," Dimaria concluded.

"Precisely. I wasn't exactly a part of the Shields at that time, but apparently the Emperor's personality completely changed when he brought Natsu to the kingdom. Before, he used to to be cruel, and look at all his people with fake kindness with no care for their well-being. He considered everyone as pawns. But after, the Emperor suddenly turned nice and caring of everyone. This drastic change in personality brought instant fear to his current Shields."

"Why?"

Brandish looked at Dimaria with a dull expression. "You are really ill informed… Supposedly, the Emperor has a curse. It makes him immortal but he is not allowed to care for life or else the curse will activate and kill every living thing in his range."

"Why did you say 'supposedly'?"

"I have never seen this curse activate. Although I do suppose he has been taking a lot of 'vacations' away from the kingdom."

"Maybe he's trying to lift his curse or something since he now has two family members he should care about at the kingdom," Dimaria mumbled.

Once the conversation stopped, the two girls stood in silence— with the background noise of a bustling city in the middle of a cheerful celebration event.

"Oh crap, we should start searching for the prince right now!" Dimaria realized as she started running to her side of the kingdom that she was supposed to search.

Brandish agreed as she ran off to her own assigned searching area.

* * *

 **Mini Chapter 2**

 **The Drunk Man**

 **~Pergrande Kingdom~~~**

August sighed as he noticed that Dimaria and Brandish were stationary and not moving to search for Natsu. They were probably having a private conversation or something.

He shook his head and continued to walk in the long, busy roads of Pergrande.

Suddenly, he saw the window of a building next to him suddenly shatter and a large man thrown through it. The man would've collided into the August if he hadn't dodged.

The man somehow made a flip in the air even at such low altitude and space, and landed on the ground with his feet. He had slightly long combed, wavy orange hair and was wearing a cloak that covered most of his body. He appeared to be drunk… Very drunk. He collapsed to the floor mumbling a lot of random stuff while a woman walked to him, cursing and spitting before she left in a fit— which caught the attention of a few civilians enjoying their country's celebration.

August was about to ignore the man and keep on walking, but he noticed the man started to talk to him.

"Old man! It's been (hic) a long time! How're you doing?" the man's face was red from drinking so much and he hiccuped a bit.

August turned to the drunk man and replied, "I apologize, but I do not know you."

The drunkard rose an eyebrow, and shakily stood up. "My bad, my bad!" he laughed, "I thought you were ol' Makarov, but there's no way he'd be so tall. Or maybe he was, it's been like what, 14-15 years since I last saw him? Haha!"

The man kept mumbling more about unnecessary information so August just turned away to leave, but the drunk man called him again.

"Wait!" the man reached his hand out to August. He took a deep breath, before saying, "Do you have any cute granddaughters?"

At that, August had enough of this man's nonsense and left, muttering about how vulgar the men of other countries were.

* * *

 **Mini Chapter 3**

 **The Secret Storage of Strawberry Shortcakes**

"I— I finally finished! I'm finished with my godly training of the day at last!" God Serena yelled in glee as he was trying to climb up a hole. It was morning and Serena just survived his underground training to the core of Earthland. Once he finally reached the surface, he noticed Irene nor Ageel were no where near the training grounds. "What's the big deal? Where'd my mentors go? Maybe they realized I was too Godly to give mediocre training to and ditched me…" he said to himself.

God Serena then spotted Neinhart who was resting on a lawn chair reading a book and holding what seems to be leftover popcorn. He called out to him, "Hey! Irene's lackey! Do you know where Irene or Sandman went off to?"

"I'm not Lady Irene's lackey!" Neinhart snapped and shook his head as he decided Serena was not worth getting into an argument with. "I do not know where Sir Ageel went off to, but I may have a faint clue as to where Lady Irene is." He closed his book and stood up.

"Follow me," Neinhart said, without giving looking at God Serena.

"A God like me does not follow," God Serena noticed Neinhart ignored him. "But I suppose this God will walk behind you…"

Neinhart led him to the basement of the palace, an area God Serena had not fully explored yet. The two stopped before a stone brick wall.

"Lady Irene sometimes likes to hide here to regain her sanity," Neinhart said as he touched one of the stone bricks. The stone brick reacted by making the whole wall shake, and like an illusion, the stone bricks disappeared to reveal a wooden door.

"Regain her sanity..?" God Serena questioned, now curious and a bit concerned about what Neinhart meant by regaining her sanity. Does that mean she's normally insane? More insane than she usually is?

The Historia Mage opened the door to reveal a room. The room had the normal royal style of Alvarez, but everything inside the room looked all old. The floor was covered in plates. In each corner of the rectangular base room were dragon statues.

Neinhart and God Serena entered the room— careful to not step on any of the plates on the floor, to find Irene sitting at a fancy table, a cake on a plate sitting in front of her on the table. Irene seemed to be deep in thought as she didn't notice the presence of the two until Neinhart spoke.

"Lady Irene, I am sorry for intruding, but God Serena has finished the first part of the training you assigned him."

"Really? That was faster than expected," Irene said without turning around to face the two men. "Then… Ageel should have your next assignment."

Neinhart faced God Serena. "Well… you heard her. If you want to continue training, you should go see Ageel… Wherever he is."

God Serena 'hmmmed' in curiosity. "What's with all the plates on the floor," he asked Irene.

"It's nothing, just leave it alone," Irene said, before forking a piece of strawberry cake in her mouth. She snapped her fingers once and then all the plates on the floor suddenly disappeared.

Neinhart was giving Serena the 'you should go leave' look. The multi-element dragon-slayer smirked. "I was told that you go here to regain your sanity. What's up with that?"

Irene placed her fork down, and still didn't turn to meet God Serena's eyes. "I don't believe you have the place to ask me questions, newcomer."

"You do have a point," God Serena nodded. Without another word, he turned around and left the room.

The Historia mage had a puzzled look.

"Neinhart, you look like you have something you want to say. You should say it," Irene said, while still staring at the cake.

Nainhart slightly tilted his head sideways. "Well… You never did tell me where your sudden obsession with strawberry shortcakes came from. It's been a few years since you started binging on such a delicate delight, but I thought your sense of taste was gone."

Irene nodded, "I guess we really haven't had a private conversation in a while, what with all the work going around. I suppose I'll tell you a little story."

Neinhart, thinking this story was going to be long, sat down in a chair across from Irene.

"It began when Natsu first came and I started to train him…"

 _~Flashback~~~_

" _ **Fire… Dragon… Yawn…**_ " _Natsu yelled in an exhausted voice as he suddenly collapsed to the ground before Irene. The two were training in Alvarez's finest, private training field. "I'm dying…"_

" _You're only dead when I tell you to be," Irene said, without really any emotion behind her voice. "I suggest you to not use your dragon slayer magic too much or you'll probably actually die… as a human."_

" _I think it'd be so cool to die and get reincarnated into a dragon," Natsu smiled, sweat all soaking his clothes and skin._

" _Let me tell you a little secret. If you use too much dragon slaying magic, you'll eventually turn into a dragon."_

" _Cool!"_

" _No, it's not cool. If you turn into a dragon, you lose all your humanity," Irene snapped._

" _What's wrong with losing your humanity?" Natsu asked._

 _Irene hesitated. "Well… You lose your sense of taste, you can't sleep… You get hated by humans… And other stuff too…"_

 _Natsu stared into Irene's eyes. "How do you know all this stuff? Wait, were you a dragon before?"_

 _Irene hit the ground hard with her staff, which made the ground tremble. "No! I was not a dragon before, I never was!" she yelled. "Training's over, go back to your room or whatever!"_

 _The fire dragon-slayer quickly got up to his feet and ran to the palace, headed to his room._

 _Irene sighed. "Why did the Emperor want me to give lessons to such a boy…"_

 _ **~The Next Day of Training…**_

" _ **FIRE—! Bleh!**_ " _Natsu screamed as he tried charging toward the Scarlet Despair, but suddenly vomited and fell to the ground._

 _Irene didn't even bat an eye. "What's wrong?" she asked, but wasn't willing to do anything._

 _Natsu groaned. "Happy and I accidentally spilt a gigantic pile of raw fish in my room. At first we had fun and tried to swim in my fish filled room, but I think the smell that's on me is starting to get to me. It smells so horrible! But I can't help but get hungry when I think of cooking the fish...!"_

 _Irene shook her head in disapproval. "Go take a shower. I can't have you throw up everywhere when the cause of your throw up is not a punch to the stomach."_

" _Yes Ma'am!" Natsu saluted. Before running to his private bathroom in the palace, he asked, "Aren't you bothered by the smell?"_

" _No. Now just go before I think of washing you in the shower."_

 _Natsu took one last glance at Irene and then skedaddled to the bathroom._

 _ **~A few minutes later~**_

 _Natsu walked back to the training grounds with a curious expression. "Irene," he started to ask. "Can you tell me more about what happens to dragon-slayers when they turn into dragons?"_

" _How would I know? I was never a dragon," she lied._

" _Zeref told me you were once a dragon."_

 _Irene rolled her eyes. She thought she just had to train the boy, not give him her backstory. "Fine, I'll tell you my story. But I won't give the details."_

 _Natsu nodded._

" _I created dragon-slayer magic. I used so much that I started to turn into a dragon. The people started to fear me and so they started to beat me and torture me, and other stuff little kids your age shouldn't know about." Irene said everything in simple sentences in hopes to get through a simple mind. "I finally reached my breaking point and raged and fully transformed into a dragon. I destroyed everything. Then fled to an area in hopes that no one would find me because I hated being seen as a dragon. But then the Emperor found me and turned be back into a human but said I was still a dragon in the inside. I figured out that I couldn't do stuff that humans couldn't normally do like taste or sleep. After transforming back into a human, I was cursed with being stuck in a 'Dragon's soul'. And here I am, here in this Kingdom as a Shield of Alvarez."_

" _Woah… I don't think you'd make a good story teller," Natsu chuckled._

" _You little—! Forget this, I'm too tired today. We'll resume training tomorrow," Irene stomped her feet and walked towards her own quarters._

 _Natsu smiled, "See you tomorrow!"_

 _ **~Next Day~**_

 _Irene and Natsu met again, on the same slightly burnt training field as the day before and the day before. But this time, Natsu brought a box._

 _Natsu initiated the conversation. "I have a solution for your inability to taste."_

 _His words actually got Irene's hopes up._

" _First, you can accept that you are a dragon." This proposal resulted in Natsu getting crashed to the ground by an explosion that Irene created just above his head._

 _After groaning about how many bones he possibly broke, Natsu said, "My other solution is… You can accept you are human, and that you always have been. You can think, you can feel, you have ten fingers…. You look human and you can do about anything— if not more— than any other human can do. You just can't taste or sleep._

" _But I have a solution for that!" Natsu held the box out to Irene._

 _Irene reluctantly took it and opened the box._

" _...A cake?"_

" _A Strawberry short cake to be specific. Larcade and I baked it especially for you," Natsu seemed proud in his baking skills._

" _What's the point? I can't even—"_

" _Just try it."_

 _Irene shook her head. Either this was going to do nothing or this cake was poisoned. Either way, nothing would happen. She took a fork that was placed in the box and took off a piece of the cake. The moment her tongue touched the cake, her eyes started to water. "This tastes… horrible!"_

" _Aw…" Natsu lowered his head in disappointment._

" _I can taste that it's horrible? This must be some sort of miracle! What did you do?"_

 _Natsu put his thumbs up. "I made Larcade use his magic on this food. According to him, it's supposed to activate your pleasure senses so that it leads you into thinking that what you taste is good. I never thought that his pervert magic would be useful! Haha!" he laughed. "But you're not supposed to think that you tasted something bad… Maybe my baking skills really do suck, or perhaps Larcade's magic is faulty."_

" _This is good enough!" Irene cheered in excitement. She was so stunned. She never thought she was ever going to taste anything— or anything bad tasting— in forever._

" _There's more good news!" Natsu smiled. "I figured out that your inability to taste or sleep isn't because you're a dragon!"_

" _What?"_

" _Remember the other day when I was covered in fish stench? I noticed how you didn't react to the putrid stench at all. Dragon slayers are supposed to have enhanced smell, so the stench should have affected you even more, like at least make a green face when I vomited. Assuming that you didn't have a sense of smell, I did some research and I learned that most of what we think of taste is actually smell. So basically if you can't smell, you can't really taste much either."_

 _Irene nodded. She didn't really think that she lost her sense of smell since everything 400 years ago didn't exactly smell great. She didn't even think about the odor of flowers, flowers that everyone said to smell good._

" _The cause of your loss of smell is probably from the beating you received when those humans, since some cases of loss of smell is from damage to certain nerves in the brain."_

 _Irene was actually shocked. This kid that Zeref had brought in a couple days ago is actually pretty smart._

" _As for your inability to sleep, my guess is that it's most likely caused by stress from believing you're a dragon, something you always told yourself you weren't, and probably from post traumatic stress disorder— remembering the bad times of your past and staying in constant worry."_

 _Irene looked at Natsu in awe. A light shined down on her like when Zeref turned her back to her human form._

" _While this is all theoretical, my guess is that if you were actually a dragon, you would actually be able to taste and sleep. My brother probably told you that you were still a dragon in the inside because you probably have a longer life-span and you don't need to sleep in order to stay alive. So if I were you, I'd actually wish I was a dragon," Natsu chuckled._

 _Irene smiled, for the first time in front of Natsu. And then she suddenly paused to think on a certain two words. 'My brother…' Her eyes suddenly widened._

" _The Emperor is your brother?!" Irene recalled the day Zeref introduced Natsu to the kingdom. He said nothing about there being a blood relationship between the two of them. She just thought that Zeref brought Natsu to the kingdom as a potential Shield._

" _Oh right… I was supposed to keep that a secret a while longer… hehe…"_

 _Irene shook her head in disbelief. Wait, then Natsu is also around 400 years old… These Dragneel brothers are weird… and geniuses._

 _Natsu decided to change the subject back to the original subject. "Even more good news, I think I know of a way to cure your inability to smell and taste. If my theory is correct, then if we just heal the damaged nerves that cause you to not be able to smell, then you should be able to regain your lost senses. While I highly doubt there are any doctors who can heal nerves, I do know of a magic that might be able to help you. There's another dragon slayer out there who has sky dragon slayer magic. That magic could be able to heal you."_

 _At first she got worried. There are still dragon-slayers that could be able to turn into dragons, but she put that thought away for a short while. Then a light glinted in her eyes. "There are more dragon slayers? One that could be able to help me? Tell me the name of this dragon slayer."_

 _Natsu scratched his head, embarrassed. "About that… I forgot the person who wielded that magic. I remember I used to play with four other dragon slayers… but I forgot who they were… and what magic they wield, with the exception of me remembering the sky dragon-slayer magic."_

 _Irene's light didn't dim away. "I have a long life to live, maybe one day I might cross paths with this dragon-slayer. But for now, I'll be patient. Now, I will train you, with more seriousness and mercilessness than ever before."_

" _Wait, Wha—"_

 _Then the real training for Natsu began, where every day for the little dragon-slayer was hell._

 _Irene smiled… 'Thank you'_

 _~Flashback end~_

"When I regain my taste, the first thing I'm going to taste is a strawberry shortcake."

"So that's why the prince and you seem so close. You're basically like mother and son."

Irene smiled, feeling grateful. "It's weird, huh. After murdering my husband and abandoning my child, I am blessed with Zeref, a man who won't ever betray me, and Natsu, a child I won't ever abandon. It's just weird… does a horrible person like me deserve this?"

"I believe everyone deserves some sort of forgiveness, no matter what they do," Neinhart nodded. "But speaking of your real child, do you think she's dead?" Neinhart asked.

"Regretfully, my daughter may have died a long time ago. In the afterlife she may never forgive such a woman as myself. I really wish I hadn't abandoned her all those couple of decades ago. But if there's a chance that she lived and grew up to be a strong, beautiful woman, that's all I need to be happy for her, even if she hates me."

"Lady Irene, it brings me joy that you have finally found peace."

Irene nodded, then placed a plate in front of Neinhart. "Could you get me another slice of cake, please?"

Neinhart sweatdropped. "Sure…" he nodded and left the room.

After a few minutes, Irene wondered to herself, "Perhaps if Erza lived then she would really like the taste of strawberry shortcakes."

* * *

 **If there's any way to better organize this, tell me. Please. Like would you prefer to have the mini chapters before the actual chapter? Or am I just overreacting and this format is not as messy as I think it is.  
**

 **The stuff I wrote about Irene. I hope it wasn't too cheesy. It was either come up with a random spell or be a bit scientific about it. Well, it's just my theory and if it turns out to be wrong (Which it probably will be, there's not much science in Fairy Tail) then I really won't mind. I enjoyed writing it, and this is a fanfiction, so... Same for the Garou knights. It used to be have Natsu one-hit kill them, but I just added a bit more battle to it.  
**

 **And the long awaited reaction. Well, you only got the reaction of the King. Was it a lackluster or just right?**

 **Well... Thanks for Reading, hope you enjoyed.  
**

 **Hope you didn't dislike my tiny twist with the royal family and Eclipse Arc... XD (You're going to see more twists, sorry for ruining your expectations everyone.) Got any problems with this story, tell me. I can improvise :P  
**

 **Happy New Year!**

 **To Be Continued.**

 **(** **Woo! For once I didn't take three months to update this story!)**


	5. He Who Leaped Through Time

**Chapter Five**

 **He Who Leaped Through Time**

 **~Fiore | Mercurius Palace~~~**

"Princess!" Natsu yelled as he rolled down his sleeve and vigorously climbed up the stairs from the Abyss Palace to catch up with the princess.

"What is it? I don't have much time for you!" Hisui snapped as she turned around to face Natsu. Her expression immediately changed from annoyed to shocked when she saw the unconscious king in his arms. "Wh- What happened to my father? What did you do to him?"

"Er- Wait, um, he just passed out from exhaustion. You know these stairs that come from the Abyss Palace and lead to the Palace's basement are incredibly long. I don't think his old body could take it and he just fainted," Natsu lied. He was not going to tell this girl his true identity and have her freak out. Good thing the Princess of Fiore had never visited Alvarez before, at least that's what he thought.

Hisui rolled her eyes. "Whatever, just give him to me," she said as she offered to carry the old man.

"Are you sure? Your father is pretty heavy. I wouldn't want you to collapse out of exhaustion too."

"Fine, carry him until we reach the end of the stairs."

Natsu nodded, and the two proceeded to run up the stairs.

After five minutes up climbing the stairs in an awkward silence, Natsu decided to initiate a conversation. He knew it was good to be on good terms with royalty of other countries, so it would good to start now, even if the princess didn't know he was a prince.

"Excuse me for asking you questions, but… About this man you entrusted with the Eclipse Gate. Why did you trust him? Like, he must have been very trustworthy if you trusted him enough to let him use a magical device that enables one to travel through time." To make himself sound like he never knew anything about the Eclipse Gate prior to this conversation, he added, "You called it the… Eclipse Gate?"

Hisui narrowed her eyes at Natsu. She seemed like she was the type of person who didn't like to talk about her mistakes.

"...Nevermind."

"No, it's fine. If you pledge to help me in this crisis, I'll tell you," Hisui said.

"Uh, sure."

The green haired princess inhaled deeply. "The man I trusted to use the Eclipse Gate, well I didn't really know him. He used to be a guild master that I really looked up to because he was always known to be a really great man. And he was never afraid to stand up against the council. I wanted to be like him, a kind person who could stand up for their beliefs, no matter who opposes them."

"So he was like a role model to you?"

"More like he reminded me of my father, just braver. One day, news spread that he had died. I was really sad until he suddenly showed up at one of the Palace Gatherings. It was a shock when I learned who he was, and it was an even bigger shock when he told me he knew of the secret Eclipse project going on and planned on going back in time to defeat kill Zeref."

Natsu flinched again. He still had no idea why anyone would want to kill his brother.

"I was still a bit young and naive for my age. I was really just a teenager, but I really thought that I was mature enough to handle things like this. So I gave him permission to help us in the Eclipse Gate plan. I suppose I didn't even distrust him because of all the good rumors about him," Hisui's voice trailed off into the empty air.

"But rumors were just rumors. I heard him speak to himself about turning time back to Year 777. Why he was talking to himself, I have no idea. But I did know for certain, that the Black Wizard was still an immortal at that time. So I tried to call the guards, but that man spotted me. He then threw me into the Abyss Palace… You know the rest of the story."

"Hmm…"

"Now that you know this, I'm telling you that if you capture the man that is impersonating my father, please do not unmask him no matter what happens. As said before, he was famous for being the guild master of a very famous guild. If they learn that their former guild master was alive and being treated as a criminal under all the chaos of the Eclipse Gate, I fear that they may take some irrational actions. I would like to avoid that at all costs."

"I see…" Natsu said. "Okay. If I capture your father's impersonator, I do not unmask him. Got it."

Hisui grumbled with a depressed look, "I'm actually surprised you believe all this stuff."

"There's nothing wrong in believing in something. Although… Coming to this place has convinced me that literally anything can happen. But I think you should be more concerned about telling secrets or important information to people you don't know. First the king's impersonator, now me? Man, you've still got a lot to learn before you get crowned queen of this kingdom. Haha."

"Like you would understand anything!" Hisui snapped as she quickened her pace up the stairs.

"I think I'd understand a lot," Natsu quietly chuckled to himself as he also started to quicken his pace.

 **~~Some time later~~~**

Natsu and Hisui finally reached the end of the stairs, where they were greeted by the ground suddenly shaking violently. The lacrimas that lit up the palace flickered a bit. Natsu figured that the Eclipse Gate just opened, as he could feel a high pressure of Zeref's magical presence flooding the area.

Suddenly there was an ear blasting scream and a few loud thumps that echoed throughout the whole palace.

A horrific voice echoed throughout the whole palace. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" it screamed.

"Were we too late?" Hisui whispered in horror, as she quickly pushed herself to go forward.

Natsu followed her lead and he wearily looked behind him, as if expecting someone to suddenly appear out of nowhere.

They reached closer to the celebration room, where all the mages were supposedly celebrating a successful end of the Grand Magic Games. Instead of cheers and civilized chatter, they heard more screaming and the sound of a lot of magical attacks.

The duo quickened their pace, until they finally entered the celebration room. The room was a complete mess. It seemed like most of the mages fled. The mages who were still in the room, however, were fighting a giant gray scaled dragon that stood in the center of the room.

"A dragon?" Hisui gasped in surprise. "Did it come from the Eclipse Gate?"

" **Lightning Dragon's Roar!** " one of the mages, a blonde and well built man with a lightning shaped scar on his face, yelled. A large surge of lightning exploded from the man's mouth and struck towards the dragon in blink of an eye.

Natsu took note that there was yet another dragon slayer in this capital. But this dragonslayer smelled like he had a dragonslayer lacrima inside him, so this one was probably not one of the original five 'real' dragonslayers. Like Sting and Rogue who also smelled like they had dragonslaying lacrimas.

The dragon took a direct attack from the lightning mage, but only appeared slightly wounded. It just shrugged off the attack, as it prepared its own roar attack on the remaining mages in the room.

"Get Out!" Hisui screamed at the mages, as she didn't want to see anyone get obliterated by the dragon.

Natsu, not wanting to see anyone obliterated either, made a move. He knew a dragon's attack was devastating and could fatally injure a man. With no time to hesitate, Natsu thrust the king into Hisui's arms, then ran and leaped towards the dragon, about to attack the dragon with his own dragon slaying magic. " **Fire dragon's...** " he yelled as he engulfed his whole body in flames. " **Sword horn!** "

His head clashed with the dragon's scaly head, and the flames transferred from Natsu's body to the dragon, igniting the dragon's whole body in fire. The headbutt was able to push the dragon against a wall. A wall that hopefully wasn't an important wall.

The dragon dug its claws in the floor and roared in agony, it wasn't a fire resistant dragon, as it spread its wings and started to flap. It seemed like it was trying to blow out the flames with the wind it created from beating its wings. Everyone in the room tried to stand their ground from the strong winds.

However, instead of blowing out the fire, an opposite effect was taken on the flame, and the flames grew larger than before, and continued to eat away at the dragon's scales.

The Dragon kept roaring in agony until its roars turned into sad wails. Hisui even felt pity for the dragon, for she knew that burning to death was one of the most painful deaths for any creature. It soon collapsed, with its whole body charred black.

Natsu extinguished the flames that engulfed the dragon with a single snap of his fingers. He didn't really like killing things, even dragons, but Irene and Igneel had taught him that Dragon Slayers existed for a reason. They may have told him different reasons, but both reasons included killing dragons.

He was quickly confronted by the lightning mage with a serious, and weary, look. "What are you?"

"A mercenary, hired by the princess over there," Natsu pointed to Hisui. He also sweatdropped about his second quick, made-up lie. Being a prince meant getting into politics. And getting into politics meant becoming a liar.

A white-haired girl popped up from behind the lightning dragonslayer. "Princess?"

They turned their gazes to see Hisui, who unsurprisingly looked like a homeless person since most of her clothes were torn from being in the Abyss Palace for so long. It seemed like Hisui didn't notice that most of her body was exposed. They looked like they didn't believe she was the princess.

"Well… she does have a crown…" the blonde spiky haired man sweatdropped.

"What's the surprise? The king is a pumpkin, I think it's an upgrade to have a future human ruler… despite her… appearance," the white haired girl carefully chose her words.

Hisui's face grew red like a tomato and tried to cover her upper body with her arms. "DON'T LOOK!"

The white haired girl sighed, "Typical women…" She turned her gaze to Natsu. "My name is Mira, the scary looking blonde man is Laxus. Who could you be?"

"Natsu."

"You're pretty strong, Natsu." Mira looked at Laxus with a smirk. "Stronger than Laxus."

"Shut up!" Laxus looked away to hide his frustrated look.

"Heh, if Ivan was still in charge, he'd—"

"It's too soon to joke about that," Laxus growled.

"My bad."

Natsu confusedly looked at the two. "Can you tell me the situation here?"

Hisui nodded in agreement, as she saw the remaining mages in the room lie down and rest.

"I don't really know much other than that a dragon suddenly crashed into this room and destroyed about almost everything. Many of the mages escaped while I tried to handle the dragon. I would assume most of the mages are trying to evacuate the people in the city. I did hear another dragon, though…" Laxus was interrupted by the sound of an explosion, a dragon's roar followed.

"What was that?!" Hisui screamed.

"You should just worry about getting new clothes," Natsu said as he turned to look at Mira and Laxus. "Do you guys happen to conveniently know any Celestial Mages in the area?"

"Y-yeah…" Mira trailed off.

"Could you bring one here? You can ask questions later."

To Natsu's surprise, Mira complied… " **Satan Soul.** " Her appearance suddenly changed drastically as her body looked like she merged with a demon. Bat-like wings sprouted from her back and she flew out of the room. If Natsu recalled correctly, that must have been take-over magic she used. Probably.

"That Mira, so easily rushing into doing what she believes what could help people," Laxus sighed. "I need proof other than a dragon slayer and a princess I never knew existed til now, to believe what you're doing will help this situation."

Natsu smirked. "Well, I'm not going to give you any proof. You can just sit back and relax while I slay all the dragons," Natsu started walking towards the back door, where he felt the presence of the Eclipse Gate somewhere behind those doors.

"Wait," Laxus yelled as he closed his eyes and tried to resist the feeling that Natsu just might be bad news. "There are four other dragon slayers, and they're probably tag teaming to fend off some other dragons."

"Thanks," Natsu said as he pushed open the back doors. "You know, if you don't want to feel left out, you can always tag team with me."

Laxus face-palmed, he already knew this fire dragon slayer was going to be annoying as hell.

But he couldn't just sit back and do nothing. After all, his guild... his family was in trouble.

"I'm in," Laxus sighed in defeat.

"Cool, let's go dragon slaying!" Natsu grinned.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Somewhere in the Capital~~~**

The ground had been shaking a lot recently. There were also some questionable sounds the echoed the sky that sounded like a beast's roar. However, that didn't stop Mest in trying to fix the whole mistake of accidentally teleporting the prince of Alvarez to Fiore. It shouldn't be considered kidnapping though, Mest thought he himself was the victim in this situation.

"Where's the prince?" Mest demanded of Happy, in an interrogation kind of way.

"I told you, I don't know! And even if I did know, there was no way I'd tell you! Who are you anyway?" Happy yelled, but the sound of his voice was compressed because Mest held his hand over the cat's mouth.

"I'm the fool who accidentally brought you and the prince here," Mest hissed quietly.

"Really?" Happy turned his head to look at Mest. "Thank you so much! Thanks to you, I got to meet the love of my life: Carla."

Mest rolled his eyes.

"Her name is so nice, it rolls off the tongue so easily," Happy exclaimed.

"Shhhhhh," Mest growled.

"Carrlla."

"Shut it!"

"Carrrrrrrrrrrrrllllllla~"

"Shut up!" Mest yelled, which got the attention of the nearby civilians. They looked at him, wondering why a man would tell a cat to shut up.

Suddenly, the ground started to shake hard like an earthquake, which caused Mest to lose his balance and fall down. During his fall, he accidentally let go of Happy.

"I'm finally free!" Happy exclaimed as he sprouted his wings and flew to the sky away from Mest. "See you, sucker!"

And the Exceed left, soaring to immeasurable heights of the sky.

"Get back here!" Mest yelled in irritation. He cursed to himself about how he keeps screwing things up. Then he noticed Happy was flying back to him.

"DRAGON!" Happy cried as he flew back into Mest's arms.

"Huh?" the teleportation mage was confused until he saw a giant shadow of a winged creature covering the sky, and it was flying towards their location.

"WHAT THE HELL?" his eyes bulged out.

The civilians nearby were, however, not panicking. It seemed like they thought this dragon was some projection by the capital to celebrate the Grand Magic Games. Mest would have believed that too, if he hadn't noticed the dragon was preparing a breath attack, as its jaws were opening wide and some certain type of energy was building up in its mouth.

Dragons were not creatures to be reckoned with, so Mest prepared to teleport himself out of there until he heard, " **Sky Dragon's ROAR!** "

A giant blast of wind blew at the dragon's face, and startled the dragon. It didn't seem to do much damage but the dragon did stop its breath attack. Mest looked at Wendy, who seemingly appeared on top of a water fountain.

"Wendy! Carla!" Happy cheered.

"What? Happy?" Wendy exclaimed. "Glad to see you're safe!"

"Focus on the dragon, talk later!" Carla yelled.

"Oh, right!"

In the sky above the dragon, there was a figure of a human. " **Iron dragon's…** " The human, most likely Gajeel, extended his arm into a steel pole and swung it downwards toward the dragon's wings" " **Club**!"

With the added gravity of swinging the steel club downwards while falling in the sky, Gajeel was able to muster enough power to damage the wing and push the wing downwards. The dragon roared in surprise, and since one wing was unable to support the dragon in the air, the dragon landed into the ground, not so gracefully.

"Wow Gajeel!" Wendy cheered as she jumped to where Mest was at. She was greeted by an applause from a crowd of citizens who still thought these dragons were all part of a simulation. "Ah, t-thank you. But you should all get away from here, those dragons are actually real!"

At that, the whole crowd dispersed in panic and ran away from the scene.

Carla face-palmed sarcastically, "Good job Wendy…"

"I'm s-so sorry," Wendy cried. With teary eyes, she looked at Mest. "Are you okay?"

"Uh… Yeah," Mest replied awkwardly.

Gajeel spun in the air and he turned his arm into an iron sword. " **Iron Dragon's Sword!** " he yelled as he was planning to stab the dragon in his fall.

Unfortunately, the dragon roared a beam of fire at Gajeel as he was falling.

"Lily!" Gajeel yelled, and immediately, his trusted Exceed caught Gajeel in the air and flew away, to avoid getting hit by the roar attack. They were lightly grazed by the attack, but not too hurt.

Pantherlily sighed in relief as he carried Gajeel to the ground next to Mest.

"Finally, a real challenge!" Gajeel smirked.

"You've never fought a dragon before, have you?"

"Nope, well, other than Metalicana— but that doesn't count."

"I can't believe we're actually fighting a dragon…" Wendy whimpered as tried to heal the small wound that Lily and Gajeel caught.

"Aye!" Happy cheered.

"Wait, wait!" Mest interrupted the two dragonslayers. "Just what's going on here?"

Gajeel crossed his arms. "Hmm… I don't really know. I just know these dragons suddenly came out from a large gate."

"WHAT?!" Mest exclaimed. _First, he accidentally kidnaps the prince. Now Fiore's kingdom is suddenly having a Dragon crisis? The world seems to be falling apart!_

"No matter," Gajeel smirked. "Now it seems I can actually earn the title 'Dragon Slayer'. Right, little girl?"

"Uhh… Umm… I- I don't really like fighting… But I'll do whatever I can do to support you!"

The Iron Dragonslayer sighed. "Well, that's better than most responses I got from you..."

* * *

 **~Fiore | Mercurius Palace~~~**

After running out of the palace, they finally found the Eclipse Gate. It was really just a giant gate that sat in the backyard of the palace.

Natsu noticed how there was a giant bunch of mages trying to close the gate manually, by pushing the doors of the gate to close. Some tried to destroy it with magic, but none were even able to scratch the gate.

"What's that?" Laxus asked.

"The Eclipse Gate. It's a magical device that connects two time periods together. It must be connected to a time approximately four hundred years ago…" Natsu said, while pondering about the user's intent of this gate. If dragons were coming out then the gate could be malfunctioning, or it was the user's intent to release dragons into this time period.

Despite all the mage's effort, another dragon stepped out of the gate, into this time period. The dragon seemed to be of the fire type. Fire based attacks wouldn't work well against it, no matter how strong the fire. Natsu knew any of his fires wouldn't really work great, and he knew Laxus wasn't exactly strong enough to actually defeat the dragon. It wasn't just Laxus though, it seemed as though this whole kingdom was falling behind greatly in terms of power compared to Alvarez or certain other countries.

"We should merge our attacks onto that dragon," Natsu suggested to Laxus. His fire could strengthen Laxus' electricity enough to do some significant damage to the dragon.

"Like a Unison Raid? Don't we need like strong bonds or something?"

"Meh, I know how to cheat the system," Natsu smirked. He lived with Spriggans who knew cheat magic, surely he would discover some ways to cheat magic. "Of course, this attack won't be as strong as an actual Unison Raid. Come on, there's no time to hesitate, we're just going to push that dragon back through the gate. If we're lucky, we might even scratch that gate."

If the dragon would be pushed back through the gate, then Natsu's assumption that the Eclipse gate was malfunctioning would be correct.

"...Let's get this over with," Laxus sighed.

The two both inhaled deeply, as they both prepared their roar attacks.

" **Lightning Dragon's….** "

" **Fire Dragon's….** "

" **Roar!** "

A giant swirl of fire combined with a giant surge of lightning, creating a sort of a blast of fire and electricity. The combined roar headed to the dragon at an incredibly fast speed thanks to the lightning. Within a blink of an eye, the roar attack blasted the dragon and the gate… and unfortunately caught some people near in an explosion that consisted of embers and lightning.

"Oh… Whoops," Natsu sweatdropped.

"Idiot!" Laxus growled as he ran towards the explosion to retrieve any injured.

The smoke from the attack cleared, to reveal a non-damaged Eclipse Gate. The dragon however, was gone. It was probably thrusted back through the gate. The people who were caught up in the attack? Well, they were going to be out of commission for a while.

Natsu smacked his own head for his idiocy. "Don't tell me Zeref built this gate with some magic resistant metal," he sighed.

"I'm going to get you for this!" Laxus threatened in the distance as he picked up the injured and brought them inside the palace, where it was hopefully safer.

"I don't think I made a good impression on this nation…" Natsu depressingly sighed to himself. He then spotted a certain pumpkin mascot near the Eclipse gate, who seemed to have been caught up in the explosion. That had to be the imposter of the king.

"Laxus! I know you probably hate me or something, but do me a favor and tie up the pumpkin mascot! He's the one in charge of activating the Eclipse Gate!"

"As if I'd keep listening to y-!" Laxus paused. He realized there was something familiar with the person inside the pumpkin costume. The scent strangely made him feel nostalgic, but he couldn't remember whose scent this belonged to. He picked up the the pumpkin mascot. The costume was still intact, Laxus was about to tear off the pumpkin helmet, but a voice yelled.

"DON'T REMOVE THE HELMET!" Natsu found wheezing Hisui standing in front of the Palace's back door. She wore new clothing: a dress that made her look more like royalty. "That's an order!" she huffed and glared at the lightning mage.

Laxus stopped himself from removing the helmet. But his curiosity didn't stop.

"Natsu!" Natsu recognized Mira's voice. The white haired girl was flying in the air in her Satan Soul, and she carried Lucy. The two landed on the ground, a few meters away from Natsu.

"It's you?" Lucy gasped in surprise.

"Great, now we can close the gate!" Natsu smiled.

"How so?" Mira inquired.

"The gate can only be open, and closed, by a celestial mage who wields the twelve golden keys. So we have a celestial mage *points at Lucy* and the twelve golden keys *points at golden keys scattered across the floor*." Natsu guessed that the celestial mage who opened the door may have dropped the keys when she realized that dragons were coming out of the gate.

"But I-" Lucy muttered. Her pupils shrunk when she saw the golden keys, like she was terrified of something.

"Hmm?" Natsu looked at the blonde girl who easily resembled Anna Heartfilia. He noticed how she had been looking at the ground the whole time. He looked to Mira and Laxus for any answers for Lucy's behavior but they both avoided his gaze.

"I can't do it…" Lucy's lips were trembling and she closed her eyes. "I… I'm not strong enough!"

The fire dragonslayer narrowed his eyes at Lucy. "You may think you're not strong enough able to do this, but the fact is: you're the only one here who CAN do it."

Lucy sobbed, "I really can't…" Tears formed from her eyes.

"Can't you just try?"

Mira grabbed Natsu's shoulder and she held a stern look. "That's enough," she whispered. "I had forgotten that Lucy's… well, she's emotionally unstable when it comes to her using her magic…"

Natsu looked at Lucy in silence. She was clearly in no state to close the Eclipse Gate, let alone able to push herself to perform any magic. And he couldn't just force her to close the gate… last time he forced a girl to do something, he ended up being the size of an atom for a few minutes. He could sarcastically thank Brandish for that punishment.

Natsu looked at the Eclipse Gate, knowing that another dragon could pop out of there any moment now. Not like he wouldn't be able to take care of it.

"I'll do it," Hisui volunteered, to everyone's surprise. "I am also a Celestial Wizard… kind of. The only key I've ever wielded was a silver key that summoned a weird snowman puppy thing, but if by any chance I can close it… I'll do it."

Natsu nodded but wondered, "But shouldn't you watch over your father?"

"He's resting in a bedroom," Hisui said as she gathered the golden keys.

Lucy stood in silence, in shame.

Suddenly, everyone froze in place for a second. Natsu felt it, a sinister, powerful aura from within the Eclipse Gate. Something else was now going to come out of the gate. Laxus and Mira must have noticed something dangerous was about to appear, as instinctively, electricity surrounded Laxus, and Mira transformed into a different, higher class demon.

Natsu gulped. "Hisui, start using the keys. The keys should respond to the Eclipse Gate and be able to close the gate on its own."

"Right!" Hisui sweated as she stepped in front of the Eclipse Gate.

Natsu quickly realized this task would be nearly impossible if Hisui had barely any stamina and didn't have any contracts with any of the keys.

The heavy presence within the Eclipse Gate grew more dark and filled the air with a very powerful magical pressure. The earth started shaking to indicate another creature was to appear out of the gate. Dark clouds started to roll over the darkening sky above them. The weather seemed to be chilled about what was about to appear from the gate.

Was it a Dragon King?

Was it some Monster that only existed 400 years ago?

Oh god, Natsu wondered. What if it was Irene from 400 years ago?

Soon, they saw a figure step out of the Eclipse Gate. There were no loud thuds that were usually created when a dragon took a step on the earth. No, this wasn't a dragon. The figure stepped out of the Eclipse Gate was the size of a man.

Laxus whispered in shock, "A human from a different time period?.."

"Can one human truly exert so much magical power?" Mira gasped.

This was a man with long spiky hair, with a silver bluish color. His skin was tanned. He reminded Natsu of a certain history lesson where Zeref drew a picture of a man that resembled a lot like the man standing before him.

The man shot glares at only Natsu and Laxus, as if they were the only two who interested him. "Dragonslayers…" Natsu heard the man whisper.

"I take it that you're Acnologia?" Natsu asked the man, raising some confusion and surprise among the others.

"Do you mean the dragon of apocalypse?" Hisui gasped, but tried to steady her focus on using the golden keys.

The man licked his lips and with a menacing tone, he said, "And what of it?"

Natsu narrowed his eyes. This was no easy opponent. According to Zeref, he would need the power of some forbidden magic to defeat this dragon… or dragon slayer.

Judging by how his skin was scaly and his hands were just a bit claw-like, this Acnologia might have not gained the ability to transform into a dragon yet.

Which would mean this could be the only time to fight him at his weakest.

This could be the best time to kill the dragon of apocalypse.

* * *

 **~Pergrande Kingdom~**

"I can't believe we were able to search the entire kingdom of Pergrande in just a few hours," Brandish said. "I guess I underestimated our abilities."

"Starving…" Dimaria sighed.

August looked at the sky. He could feel some sort of powerful magical energy in the far west.

"What's wrong August? You look like you have something on your mind," Brandish narrowed her eyes at the direction August was looking at.

"You notice that magic too, right?" the old man scratched his beard. "If I'm not wrong, I'm sure that magical presence belongs to Acnologia. It appears to be mixed in with Emperor's magic though."

"Acnologia, as in the dragon that the Emperor wants to kill? Is the Emperor there too?" Dimaria tightly held her stomach. She didn't bring any money with her on this mission.

"That is precisely who I'm talking about. But I doubt the emperor is there, he's not one to let his magical presence be easily found."

"Should we go check it out?" Brandish asked as she laughed at Dimaria's suffering state.

"No, our objective is to find the prince," August said.

"Hmm… But my gut tells me that Prince Natsu is like a magnet to danger. I wouldn't be surprised if he was picking a fight with that dragon."

"Heh, you're actually right for once," Brandish chuckled.

"I don't want your praise, I want your food," Dimaria groaned.

"Quit complaining. Let's just go to… where are we going?"

"I would assume Fiore," August looked at the map.

"To Fiore, and to get this thing over with."

* * *

 **~Magic Council Headquarters~**

"There appears to be a powerful magical presence in the Capital of Fiore."

"It's probably just some special event from their 'Grand Magic Games'."

"No, the presence seems to hold a heavy black magic. It resembles the magic of the Black Wizard, but it mixes with a magic similar to dragonslayer magic."

The meeting room of the council was hushed.

"Seriously? At a time like this? We're just about to hold a conference with some of Alvarez's shields regarding that spy and God Serena's defection!"

"He's right. The matters with Alvarez are our utmost priority. If this magical presence in Crocus is threatening, then just send some of the Wizard Saints there to resolve the issue," a man who appeared to be the chairman said.

"Who else agrees?"

Everyone raised their hands.

"Then it's settled, send notice to the Wizard Saints immediately."

* * *

 **Mini Chapter 4**

 **The Glass Making Company**

 **~Alvarez Empire~**

"Sandman! Are you here?" God Serena called as he walked to a beach. There was a small building that looked like a factory placed on a convenient plateau above the sand of the beach. God Serena could hear electric saws buzzing from the factory, so he assumed that the factory was for cutting wood.

"In here!" Ajeel's voice called from within the factory.

God Serena walked into the factory to find that the factory wasn't for chopping wood, but for creating glass. There were many small raging fires in furnaces. It was cooking sand and slowly turning it into glass. He found Ajeel and Wahl standing around a round table.

"What's all this?" God Serena asked.

"It's my own personal glass making factory," Ajeel smirked proudly.

"I'm here fixing some of the machinery," Wahl said with one hand holding a hammer and the other hand holding a screwdriver. Of course, those tools were probably just props.

"That's a lot of glass…" God Serena sweatdropped. "I knew you were crazy but I didn't know you were such a glass fanatic."

"Call me whatever you want, but I'm not the only one into this. Wahl and the prince Natsu is also part of this glass business!"

"The prince too?"

"Sweet yeah! It all started like—"

"Ajeel, no. Don't you dare have a flashback!" Wahl growled. "We have matters to attend to."

"Don't worry, I'll just tell him the gist of how this glass making company started," Ajeel smiled.

"You and your tendencies to tell stories…" Wahl sighed.

"The prince once challenged me to a battle a few years ago, and of course, I wouldn't refuse. His fire against my sand. We fought and realized that every time our magics clashed, it would create glass. After our fight ended —it was a tie by the way, just saying— we had created a battlefield full of some pretty sweet glass sculptures. Seeing the masterpiece, the prince and I came up with the same goal at the same time: To create a tunnel of glass in the ocean."

"Doesn't that goal sound a bit too random and pointless?"

"No, it's every man's dream to build a tunnel."

"I concur," Wahl smirked. "That's why I joined them on this project."

"I don't really think so," God Serena muttered to himself.

"So, my sand, prince Natsu's fire, and Wahl's ability to create a factory and machines that can automatically put the sand and fire together, we were able to create this glass making company."

"However, since prince Natsu is gone, the fires here are dying down. Soon, we won't have an infinite source of fire, until he comes back."

"Now we're just trying to figure out how to make fire without burning too much coal," Ajeel sighed as he stared at some blueprints for some invention.

"Well, I have Hellfire dragonslayer magic, if that helps," God Serena suggested.

"Hellfire? Hmm… I don't know…" Ajeel hesitated.

"I'll just try it out," God Serena said as he lit one of the furnaces up with his hellfire.

"Wait!" Wahl panicked. "Remember when the prince used his demonic flames in one of the furnaces?! Everything—"

"SHIT!" Ajeel yelled as he remembered a past tragic event involving hellish fires. "Serena! STOP!"

 _ **KABOOM!**_

The furnace blew up, which caused all the machines around it to blow up, which caused everything in the factory to blow up. The whole factory went crumbling down in ashes. All the glass that was created just shattered into millions of translucent pieces.

The man's dream of building a tunnel of glass, just exploded like that.

Wahl looked at their destroyed factory in depression.

"SERENA! I'M GOING TO F***ING KILL YOU!" Ajeel screamed as shards of glass rained down.

"Wait, wait! I have to finish my training first!"

"DIE FIRST!"

* * *

 **Hmm... It's been about 68 days since I last updated...**

 **I guess that means I'll update every 68 days then? I'm just kidding :P**

 **Thanks for being patient, and for still reading this.**

 **Don't follow this story, it makes me nervous XD**

 **But feel free to review :D**


	6. Accept This Pain, Or Break

**I'm trying to experiment with character development. Enjoy :3**

* * *

 **Chapter 6**

 **Accept This Pain, Or Break  
**

The king's eyes fluttered as recent memories rushed back into his mind. He sat up and stretched his limbs. He felt like he hadn't slept so peacefully in a long time. Then the most recent shocking memory caught up with him.

' _That's right… The prince of Alvarez was in his kingdom. It must've been a dream…'_

He could have screamed in confusion again, he knew there was no way that was a dream. However, his heart was stopping him from physically expressing his emotional distress. It was beating fast… too fast. Perhaps the strain from running for his life in that abyss has finally caught up to him.

There was suddenly a brief, loud noise. It sounded like a beast's war cry.

The king could not help but feel that his daughter was in grave danger.

He reached into the inside of his shirt and pulled out a pendant of the same color of the Eclipse Gate.

"Hisui…"

* * *

 **~Fiore | Capital ~~~**

Another dragon had emerged from the Eclipse Gate. Acnologia seemed too focused on Natsu to even feel like ending the life of the dragon that stood behind him.

Laxus, with Mira's support, would fend off the dragon while Natsu and Acnologia prepared to fight.

The air between them was heating up,and it wasn't just because of Natsu.

Acnologia seemed amused, first at the realization that he was standing in a different time period, second at the dragonslayer that stood before him. The pink haired man wasn't like the countless dragons or dragonslayers he killed before. The future dragon of apocalypse resisted the urge to charge forward. He would first wait and see what this future would throw at him.

Meanwhile, Natsu was a bit hesitant. While it was in his nature to dive into any fight without thinking, he couldn't overlook the people around him. There was Laxus: a dragonslayer that couldn't quite kill a dragon, Mira: a mage probably not able to pierce dragon scales, Lucy: some traumatized celestial mage, and Hisui: a non-combatant who can use low level celestial magic. They were not his subjects, but they were still living beings. He'd feel horrible if the day he stepped into another country was the day dragons came out of nowhere and attacked killed the people of said country.

To avoid any unnecessary damage to the area and the people in it, the fire dragon slayer kept his eyes steady on the rather silent Acnologia in front of him. Prepared for anything that would be thrown at him.

So a standoff started between the two… a standoff that would end when one of the two got impatient and started the fight.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Capital ~~~**

Hisui kept pointing the golden keys at the gate in different ways, wondering if she had to hold them in some position to get them to work. Although she was intelligent enough to know that that was not how the celestial spirit keys worked. She was just too low on magical energy and she didn't even hold a contract with any of the keys. She soon got desperate, hoping that some weird pose or dance would please the Eclipse Gate to open.

"Miss Celestial Wizard, I'd appreciate it if you help me out here…"

The blonde sniffled, but didn't give a verbal response.

The jade princess sighed, and then she snapped. "Look, if you're not going to do anything but sit and cry on my front lawn all day, then just leave! You're being a hindrance and a sight for sore eyes! You made the point of your comrade bringing you here completely useless. Plus, you're making my lawn drown!"

Hisui had full intention in hurting this girl's feelings. She wasn't normally a mean person, but Hisui couldn't give the girl a sense of comfort. Feeling comfortable in an atmosphere with dangerous killer dragons everywhere was impossible. Hisui could only give her pain. It sounded counterproductive and sadistic, but if the blonde could accept the pain from these petty insults, then she would grow (even a little bit) and get one step closer to confronting and accepting whatever pain she felt in the past.

Although Hisui believed that it would be impossible to overcome emotional barriers and trauma in one day. It was also possible that these insults would just break the girl more. Hisui closed her eyes. The thought of breaking one of her citizens was gut-wrenching.

' _But it's for the greater good'_

That was a phrase that justified the sacrifice of one being for the safety of the whole. It was the phrase she grew up with. The phrase she hated.

"Lucy Heartfilia, right?" Hisui racked her brain for information she might have read about relating to that name. Since she used to be a huge fan of Fairy Tail and she could gain more access to information than the normal public, she knew too much information that she regretted knowing. "After running away from her father, Lucy Heartfilia was sold as a slave with other girls by Bora the prominence. Was then captured by Phantom Lord to be returned back to her father for a price. However, Fairy Tail, under their fourth guild master, declared war on Phantom Lord. Then, you were recruited into Fairy Tail and lived your life as a guild member there ever since."

Hisui stopped reciting a biography of Lucy as the blonde started to cry nonstop. Explosions soon covered the field as a fight between Natsu and Acnologia broke out. Not to mention, Laxus and Mira were still trying to battle a dragon.

"I understand you didn't have a great life, but since you're a writer, you should know what the outcome of these events will be if you keep doing nothing," Hisui stopped trying to pour her magical energy in the keys and she piled all the golden keys in one hand. She looked at Lucy and knelt beside her. "The crying girl does nothing as the dragon creeps closer to obliterate her. In the second the dragon swings its mighty claws at the girl, the hero pushes the girl out of the way and gets killed in the process."

Hisui held out the keys in front of Lucy.

"I hope your story isn't like that."

Lucy, with puffy red cheeks and eyes stained red from crying a lot, looked at Hisui. Her face was the embodiment of confusion. The princess had just ridiculed and mocked who she is now and who she was in the past.

' _She knows I'm weak.'_

' _She knows I'm a failure.'_

' _She probably knows that my celestial spirits rarely respond to my summons now.'_

' _But she's still wants me to close this gate.'_

' _...'_

' _Fairy Tail has shown me this before. I could I have never learned?'_

' _...'_

' _Watch me mom'_

Rubbing the last of her tears from her face and ripping her body from the mental shackles that binded her, she slowly grabbed the keys. She was slow but not hesitant. She was going to do this. If none of her spirits listened to her, she would make them listen… somehow.

Hisui felt like she just broken a wall the blonde had surrounded herself with. While it's not exactly her job, being somewhat of a celestial wizard who _opens_ doors, she felt like she did her duty. Plus, breaking down walls and opening doors were basically the same thing.

Lucy chanted, trying to open the gates of all the keys. Nothing happened after the first many tries. But one of the keys shined for a brief second. She truly believed she could do this.

Hisui looked on, noticing how the battles surrounding Lucy and her were intensifying. Laxus and Mira were visibly exhausted, while the dragon didn't even have a scratch on it. In the other battle, Acnologia and Natsu were both worn out. It seemed like the gap between their strengths wasn't large. And surprisingly, Natsu seemed to have the upper hand.

Hisui then stared at her hands. They were doing nothing.

Now she was the one doing nothing.

She was completely startled when she heard screaming, and she heard Natsu suddenly roar, "WATCH OUT!"

She turned her head to where the dragonslayer was fighting Acnologia, to see a flash of light form from Acnologia's mouth. Acnologia had just fired his breath attack towards her and Lucy.

Hisui slammed herself against Lucy and fell to the ground to cover some distance to try to get out of the way, but it was no use, the roar attack would still hit them.

"Hisui."

That calm, familiar voice shocked Hisui.

It was her father, and he stepped between her and the roar attack.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" Hisui yelled.

Even if he meant to take the brunt of the roar, there was no way such a small, fragile body would lessen the impact. He would die in vain.

"I love you, my daughter," the king said as he held some kind of black pendant in front of him.

Hisui recognized it immediately. That pendant was made from a small chunk of the Eclipse Gate. Since it was separate from the gate, it had the ability to absorb magic power at any time.

That didn't mean that they would be saved from this situation. If it absorbed too much magical energy, then it would explode. Considering how they had used it for most of the duration of their imprisonment in the Abyss Palace to escape the prisoners, that pendant _will_ shatter.

Everything flashed before her eyes. Her sweet memories of her father. And her not so fond memories. She was helpless as Acnologia's attack directly collided with her father. For a few moments, the pendant did well to absorb the magical energy.

But then she heard a crack.

She watched in horror as the shadow of her father disappeared.

And then there was a loud explosion.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Capital ~~~**

Natsu was surprised. He was actually pushing back the dragon of Apocalypse with his base magic— even though he was four hundred years weaker...

Acnologia had suddenly collapsed and started to writhe in pain. Natsu took this opportunity to deal a direct hit against his opponent.

Acnologia started to screech in whatever sudden pain he was feeling, when suddenly one black wing had burst out from his back. It was a lone dragon wing attached to Acnologia's back.

Natsu was witnessing Acnologia's dragonification, which, he had to admit, looked pretty cool. But that wouldn't stop him from trying to kill the future dragon of Apocalypse.

" **Fire Dragon's Swor—** " he suddenly felt Acnologia's wing collide with his stomach, launching Natsu a few meters away and causing him to almost spit out his dinner.

Natsu quickly realized how Acnologia was about to release a roar attack, probably unintentionally since he couldn't stop screaming. Natsu's eyes widened when he realized that Acnologia's roar attack was going to head toward Hisui and Lucy.

"WATCH OUT!" he had screamed at them.

Just a few milliseconds after Acnologia fired his roar, Natsu aimed his own breath attack at the stream of magical energy bursting from Acnologia's mouth to somewhat negate it. The fire dragonslayer was just a smidge too late as part of Acnologia's roar reached the celestial mages.

Not wanting to learn what had become of the celestial mages, Natsu entered dragon force. He lunged towards Acnologia while covering his whole body with flames.

" **Fire Dragon's Crushing Fang!** " Natsu screamed. Just as another wing sprouted from Acnologia's back, Natsu swiped the newly born wing with his fiery claws which tore claw-like holes through the wing and severely burning it.

Acnologia responded with another scream as he swung his own dragonified claws at Natsu. Natsu jumped back, but his scarf was caught by Acnologia, which forced Natsu to bounce back into close quarters with the dragonifying man.

Acnologia suddenly widened his mouth full of razor-sharp teeth, and sunk his fangs into Natsu's shoulder, and his claws dug into his skin. The fire dragonslayer stopped himself from letting out a loud cry but blood seeped through his teeth. With the force of a wrecking ball, he slammed his head down toward where Acnologia was biting him.

A loud crack was heard, and Acnologia let go of Natsu and was seen with a lot of blood dripping from his mouth.

Natsu was pretty sure his skull just cracked, as his vision suddenly blurred and blood started streaming down from his nose. Now heavily disoriented, he saw Acnologia ran toward him.

" **Fire Dragon's Iron Fist!** " Natsu yelled as he punched nothing but the air. He would've been easy prey for Acnologia, but Acnologia's knees suddenly buckled.

Natsu's vision recovered as he watched scales of a black shine formed to replace Acnologia's skin. There was no doubt that he was seconds away from turning into a full blown dragon.

Natsu, now really desperate to stop this, kicked Acnologia's writhing body off of the ground. He jumped after Acnologia and grabbed one of his arms.

" **Fire Dragon's Grip Strike!** " Fire seared everywhere around them. Natsu, with the rest of his energy, crushed Acnologia's arm, even the bones, before blasting his foe at point blank range.

Acnologia's transforming body was launched through the air, towards the still open Eclipse Gate. Exhausted and dazed, Natsu watched as Acnologia's human form exploded into a dragon of jet-black scales and glowing azure marks. Natsu was more focused on the scars he engraved on the dragon. One of its wings was torn, and Acnologia's left arm was limp.

With the form of a large dragon, Acnologia crashed back through the portal of the Eclipse Gate, to his own time period. However, before his body was fully consumed by the gate, Acnologia's extended wings broke through the structure of the Eclipse Gate before leaving. The Eclipse Gate then started to crumble from top to bottom, before completely collapsing.

Natsu laughed to himself. It reminded him of how he used to always destroy Zeref's stuff.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Capital ~~~**

"FATHER!"

It had worked, the pendant was able to absorb most of Acnologia's attack before breaking. Hisui and Lucy were hit by the leftovers of the attack, but it was survivable. However, Hisui's father was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps his body was consumed by the attack.

"I'm not ready…" she sobbed. "I can't be Queen yet. I need you! Father…"

Lucy stood up, speechless, and in shock. It was like they had switched places. Now Hisui was the one crying on the ground while Lucy was standing and holding the golden keys.

She fought back tears for the princess. It was her fault this happened in the first place. If she hadn't refused to close the door before Acnologia appeared out of it, this whole scene would've never happened in the first place.

She clutched her keys. "Open… Please…"

Celestial spirits were supposed to listen to their Celestial Wizard. Even if they hated her, they would still come when called. It was their rule. After wondering for why they weren't coming, Lucy had concluded that she was no longer worthy. But even so, she couldn't let go of them.

"OPEN!" she screamed, eyes welling up, and threw all her keys to the air. "JUST HOW LONG DO YOU WANT TO MAKE ME CRY?"

Suddenly, she felt one of her spirits appear before her.

"Plue..?"

It was eating a lollipop.

Then another spirit appeared, and then another. One by one, they all appeared before her.

"Everyone…" Lucy's eyes started to tear up again.

One of them, recognized as Loke (or Leo), spoke up. "Oh my dear Lucy," he grabbed her shoulder with a playboy-like smile. "I would never want to make you cry." His playboy face suddenly morphed into a face much more serious.

"It's just that—"

All the spirits suddenly disappeared, and Lucy snapped back into what was happening in the real world. Just before her eyes, she saw a jet black dragon crash into the Eclipse Gate. Soon after, the Eclipse Gate crumbled down. It was destroyed.

The dragon that was fighting Laxus and Mira was disappearing, and it could be assumed that the other dragons that came from the Eclipse gate were disappearing too. Probably from the time paradox that was created when the Eclipse Gate was destroyed.

She was completely useless.

But even so, she felt good. Not about being useless, but about what had happened between her and her spirits. She wasn't exactly sure what happened though.

She relaxed her shoulders, until she remembered about the princess.

Lucy looked over to Hisui, her green hair covered her eyes.

The princess suddenly stood up and walked past the blonde.

"It's all your fault," the princess muttered under her breath.

Lucy froze, thinking that the princess was speaking to her. But Lucy realized that that wasn't the case.

She was heading toward Laxus who picked up the King's imposter. She stood next to the pumpkin man who was cradled in Laxus' arms.

"IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!" the princess madly cried.

The princess aggressively ripped off the mask of the King's imposter.

Laxus and Mira gasped. They knew who this man was.

"Old man..?" Laxus couldn't stop the air from escaping his lungs.

"THIRD GUILD MASTER OF FAIRY TAIL, FOR BRINGING THE DRAGON OF APOCALYPSE TO THIS TIME PERIOD AND BRINGING FORTH THE DEATH OF THE FORMER KING," the princess gulped. Her pupils shrunk and were clouded by revenge. "YOU ARE TO BE SENTENCED TO DEATH!"


	7. Non Compos Mentis

**Chapter 7**

 **Non Compos Mentis**

 **~Fiore~~~**

Before he sent the future dragon of apocalypse back to his own time period, Natsu saw a giant flame of hatred light up in Acnologia's eyes. Before, it was just a spark of amusement and intent to kill. Natsu let out a brief sigh among his many short breaths. He might have just given Acnologia the incentive to become even more stronger. No doubt will the Acnologia of present day be stronger, but possibly weakened due to its new battle scars.

Natsu collapsed on the field soaked with his blood. Another fight between him and Acnologia was inevitable, and Natsu would surely lose that fight.

' _The first day I escape Alvarez, this happens.'_

The fire dragonslayer felt his consciousness fading away. He could do with a five second nap, he just had to believe no one would come by and roll up his sleeve to find out he's the prince of Alvarez. He mentally chuckled to himself as he thought of August suddenly coming out of nowhere and finding his bloody body dying on the ground. All hell would probably break loose and August would probably obliterate this whole kingdom in a second. That wouldn't be good.

Natsu's eyelids grew heavier, the last thing he saw was his arm still covered in dragon scales from the dragon force he used.

" _Igneel? Igneeeeel! Are we playing hide and seek?"_

 _There was no response, other than a cool breeze that swept through the forest the boy was standing in._

" _Where are you? Igneel?" the boy tightly wrapped his scarf around his neck. He noticed the scent of the dragon he was looking for had completely vanished. "I'm sorry for eating part of your dinner last night!"_

 _The boy called for his dragon for a whole day now. The sun was starting to set, and the boy's stomach was growling uncontrollably. "Where did you go..?"_

 _Suddenly, a nice scent of roasted meat tickled his nose. The boy's mouth drooled as he noticed the scent of meat was growing stronger, even though he wasn't moving. He thought that the meat must be moving to him! He pictured a piece of meat floating in the air toward his mouth. The boy drooled more._

 _The sound of a bush rustling was heard. The young boy turned his head to the sound and found a peculiar boy. The newcomer looked at least a decade older than the boy._

 _The boy looking for his dragon didn't really care about the strange black-haired boy who had appeared out of nowhere. His mind was set on the meat. The meat…_

 _The black-haired boy kindly offered the meat to the innocent child. The meat was gobbled up at almost an instant._

 _The boy who was looking for his dragon then looked up at the black-haired boy curiously._

" _Thanks mister!" the young boy grinned. "By the way, have you happened to see a big, red dragon?"_

 _The older boy smiled. "Yes. In fact, I know where Igneel is at this very moment."_

 _The young boy's eyes lit up with energy. "You know who Igneel is? Are you friends or something?" He didn't mention how the black-haired boy's scent was familiar._

" _Yes, we are really good friends," The older boy replied. "As for where he is at the moment…"_

 _He pointed at the young boy's stomach._

" _Igneel is inside you."_

 _The young boy's face suddenly paled and sweat suddenly started to form all over his face._

" _I ATE HIM?!"_

"—ALL MEMBERS OF FAIRY TAIL!"

"DETAIN THEM ALL!"

Natsu jumped up from his slumber, the threatening screech from the princess of Fiore woke him. She had the look of a maniac, completely out of control. He suddenly felt two pairs of arms wrap around each of his shoulders. "What's happening?" Natsu rasped.

"As just declared by the princess, all Fairy Tail members are to be detained," one of the knights who picked him up said.

"But I'm not a member of Fairy Tail."

"Show us proof."

To show them proof would be to show them his Alvarez mark. There was no chance in hell he was going to do that. He prefered to be imprisoned (again), escape from the so-called Capital of Death, and roam free as an escaped 'convict'. That would be an interesting temporary life to live. Although, if any of the Shields found out, then there would be immediate war. He sweatdropped, completely clueless as what to do.

"He's not a member of Fairy Tail," the princess said as she walked closer to the knights. "Let him go."

"As you wish," the knights complied. Natsu stumbled as he tried to stand on his own feet without all the blood he had lost.

"I apologize," the princess' voice was monotone and her eyes were dead. "I would like to invite you to a Celebration Party as thanks for helping my kingdom fight the dragons. The Celebration was postponed to tomorrow night."

The princess just walked away after saying her message, leaving no hint of any emotion or determination she had the first time they had met.

Natsu flinched at the awful pain from the wounds he got from his exchanges from Acnologia. In the corner of his vision, he saw Laxus, Mira, and Lucy. They were being led by the knights.

He shook his head. This wasn't his country, he didn't have to deal with its affairs.

What he needed to do was to clean up his injuries and find Happy—

"NATSUUUUUUUUUUU!"

Speaking of the devil.

"Thank goodness you're sa—" Natsu was cut off by Happy who seemed to have more important things to say.

"YOU NEED TO SAVE HER!" Tears were streaming down Happy's face, and so was snot.

"Uh- Wha- Why— Save who?" Natsu stared dumbfoundedly at his companion.

"CARLA! SHE'S BEING TAKEN AWAY!"

"Calm down!" Natsu grabbed his feline friend and hugged him. "Now who is Carla and why is she being taken away?"

"Carla is *sniff* the love of my life!"

Natsu couldn't help but sweatdrop and chuckle silently. Happy had to be joking… right?

"She's being taken away because—- because— of something *sniff* about being a member of Fairy Tail!"

Natsu mentally facepalmed. "Seriously."

"I'm completely serious! We need to save her!"

The fire dragonslayer sighed. He was planning to sail off to a different country immediately, not get tied into another affair with this country.

Natsu sighed. Happy was staring at him with the kitten cat eyes.

After another long sigh, Natsu said, "Anything for you, buddy."

"Thank you so much!" he cried.

He scratched his pink hair as he tried to form a plan. "I guess I'll try to talk to the princess about it during the celebration…"

"You know the princess of this kingdom? That's Prince Natsu for you!"

"Shh! Not so loud," Natsu hissed.

"Aye sir!"

* * *

 **~Fiore | Inn ~~~**

"Crap, I don't have any money on me," Natsu groaned as he was about to approach the woman at the desktop to ask for a room to stay in.

"You don't have anything in your pockets?" Happy whispered.

"No, I've only been wearing my pajamas since I got here. I couldn't bring anything much either since the trip here was so unexpected. Although I guess being a royal and everything, I didn't really need to have money on me at all times."

"Are we going to sleep outside?"

Or he could trade something. The only non-ruined possession he had on him was a pendant he got from Zeref and his signature scarf. But… No… They were too precious to just sell off. He approached the woman at the desktop to try to see what he can do to earn a free stay, but the woman shook her head.

"Sorry, this whole inn is reserved for Lamia Scale."

"Lamia what? As in the half-snake half-human thing?"

"Lamia Scale," a white haired man spoke up. He just entered the inn. He gave off an icy atmosphere, similar to that of the stripper he met earlier today. "Surely you've heard of it."

"Sorry, I'm kind of a tourist here, so I don't know much of this country's guilds." He did read something about Lamia Scare in the newspaper, but he forgot what it was.

"WE'RE THE BEST OF THE BEST!" a dog-human thing yelled as he entered the inn with a short man with big eyebrows.

"Didn't we get third place in the Grand Magic Games?" said the short man with big eyebrows.

"Erf…"

"Okay, I guess I'll be on my way," Natsu said as he wobbled his way out of the inn.

The members of Lamia Scale were too distracted by their upcoming discussion to notice the injuries Natsu hid.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Crocus ~~~**

"That should do it," Natsu said as he wrapped his injuries with the cloth of Happy's bag. He looked at the night sky, realizing it was about 24-hours until the celebration party. He decided it might be best for him to rest now. "Goodnight Happy," Natsu yawned.

Happy was too busy crying over the dismantlement of his bag to care about what Natsu said. He was forced to wear Natsu's scarf to cover his Alvarez royalty status.

A few hours passed, and Natsu couldn't sleep a wink. He thought it'd be easy to sleep, since he was exhausted and heavily wounded, but he just couldn't. It was because he hadn't slept anywhere outside Alvarez for years and he couldn't trust to sleep in this kingdom, especially since he didn't know if this kingdom would throw another danger at him in his sleep. He yelled internally to himself. How could he take a few minute nap after his battle with Acnologia, but just suddenly have insomnia here and now?

He turned his bloodshot eyes toward Happy, who was sleeping peacefully.

"Lucky cat," he said as he stood up. His injuries were still killing him, and he felt incredibly weak. He still didn't know how his fatigue wasn't able to knock him into his dreams.

He gently picked up Happy and cradled him in his arms.

"So this is life outside Alvarez…" Natsu muttered to himself.

More hours passed until it was morning and Happy woke up. The duo waited more hours, eating the last fish that Happy brought in his bag. During the hours of waiting, Natsu observed how the citizens of this kingdom lived. Work, eat, gamble, sleep… it was similar to the daily life of one who resided in Alvarez. It was kind of odd, how this city could revert back to normal, like nothing happened, even though they had a dragon attack last night.

Finally, the moon rose above their heads. Sadly, at this time, Natsu felt an overwhelming desire to crawl under a bench and sleep. Only his starving stomach was his driving force.

It was time to go to that celebration party and inevitably get slapped by the princess. He was going to ask the princess to release her prisoners, there was no doubt he wasn't going to get punished for this. But he couldn't not try, since Happy wouldn't stop bothering him about getting Carla out of jail. As he walked toward his destination, he could feel someone follow him, but he just ignored the feeling, thinking it was no big deal.

Natsu walked to the Palace in horribly damaged clothing with Happy. He was surprised to see Hisui standing at the entrance of the Palace, next to a guard.

"Come with me," Hisui said, in a very gloomy voice.

Natsu and Happy complied, as they were led to a room on the second floor. Natsu heard loud music coming from a different room on the first floor, he guessed that the celebration was being held in that different room. Hisui opened the double doors to reveal a long dining table, plates of many varieties of gourmet food were lined across the table.

"This is thanks for protecting my kingdom, a private dinner specially for you," the princess' voice was very monotone.

Natsu awkwardly took a seat at the nearest chair, while Hisui sat in the chair directly across from him. "Can I really eat all of this?" he said, reluctantly. However, Happy had already started digging into the fish pile of food.

Hisui nodded, devoid of any life. Natsu wondered why the princess was so depressed. He was too busy being unconscious in the aftermath of his fight with Acnologia, so he thought he might have missed something important.

He took a small chunk of meat and placed it on his plate. He thought he would be disrespectful if he ate everything, even though his stomach was encouraging him to fill it up.

"So… What are you going to do about Fairy Tail?" Natsu asked. Hisui immediately dropped her utensils, making Natsu feel like he accidentally already hit a nerve.

"Execute their third guild master and disband the entire guild, of course," she said, in a frighteningly nonchalant tone.

Natsu shoved a whole fish in Happy's mouth, sensing that the blue exceed would protest. He stiffly sat straight up, knowing that he was walking on a very tight rope here.

"Shouldn't you at least hear him out, or at least give him a trial?" Natsu breathed in carefully.

"That's the Magic Council's job. But last time I checked, they were too busy panicking about the betrayal of their former Wizard Saint."

Natsu sweat-dropped. She was probably talking about God Serena, who had coincidentally left the said Wizard Saints to become a Shield.

He took in another deep breath. "Don't you think execution is a bit too harsh?" Who was he to say, he allowed the Shields to kill anyone they deemed a threat to the kingdom. As unfortunate as it was, he was sure that among those killed were innocent people.

"He brought Acnologia to this time period and got my father killed!" she yelled as she slammed her her fist on the table, showing her first emotion today.

Natsu was speechless. That was what he missed when he was unconscious. That news would no doubt shake the entire kingdom and maybe even the whole continent. The fact that the people of the city was still acting their daily routine was that this information had not been announced yet. He found it strange how the princess was willing to hold a celebration party at this moment though.

"More people could have died!" she yelled. "It's all his fault!"

Natsu tried to recollect his thoughts after that shock. "Wait, if I recall correctly, you were also planning to open the Eclipse gate. The same thing could have happened and you would be standing in that man's shoes now."

It was Hisui's turn to be speechless. Natsu noticed she couldn't see straight, or think straight. Her pupils were shaking, her mind floundering between logic and emotion.

Natsu whispered to Happy, "Get out of here. I don't think I can reason with her anymore."

Happy stared back at him for a second, before eating his last bite and leaving through the door.

The prince of Alvarez then focused back on Hisui. He finished eating the piece of meat he put on his plate. He then placed his utensils on the plate, and pushed the plate away from him.

"It isn't wise for a ruler to act purely on emotion," Natsu recited the words Invel had told him a few years ago.

"WHAT WOULD YOU KNOW ABOUT RULING THE KINGDOM?" Hisui screeched as she slammed her hand on the table once again. A couple of guards rushed in to see what caused the princess to yell, but they left after seeing it was just some arguing.

"Actually…" Natsu debated on whether to tell her the truth. He decided not to. Giving her more shock would only make this situation and her mental health worse. This was just her grieving over her deceased father. This is normal.

After sitting in silence for a while, Natsu gave up trying to convince her to release Fairy Tail.

"I think I should take my leave now," Natsu announced.

"WAI—!" Hisui's voice cut off suddenly. Natsu glanced at her to notice the light in her raging eyes had disappeared. The princess then sat down in her chair and stared into a void.

"Miss Princess?" Natsu said, concerned about this sudden turn of events. However, his voice didn't seem to reach her as she kept just staring into the air.

"I have finally found you," a voice behind him spoke.

Natsu widened his eyes. He remembered that voice. He quickly turned around to find the man responsible for bringing him to this foreign country.

"Mest?" he was genuinely surprised. How could this man get past the guards to get here? Did he have some kind of authority or something? However, Mest wasn't exactly a character of intimidation, so Natsu didn't feel afraid.

"By tomorrow, she won't have any memories of you or any events that include you."

The dragon slayer noticed how quiet the whole palace was. Even the loud music booming from wherever the Celebration room was had disappeared.

Natsu looked at the mage, perplexed. "Are you sure you should be tampering with the memories of your royalty?"

Mest completely ignored Natsu's question.

"War must be avoided… Yes..." Mest crept closer, with a maniacal look.

Natsu would've punched Mest in the gut again because of the creepy way Mest was acting, however, Natsu's injuries weakened him. His mind was also blanking out. He internally yelled at himself, now of all times, he was starting to get sleepy?

"So you can't be allowed to remember being here either."

Natsu fought with the darkness that was trying to pull his mind toward it.

"Memory… Manipulation Magic..?" Natsu realized as he found his mind and body completely shutting down.

"It's time to go back to your home, prince."

* * *

 **~Fiore | Crocus~~~**

"I believe this is it," August said as he looked at the Ishgar map. "This is where I last felt Acnologia's presence."

"I don't sense anything now, though..." Dimaria glanced at the Palace, thinking the castle back at Alvarez was better.

"I do faintly sense the prince," Brandish commented.

And so, their objective of bringing their beloved prince back to Alvarez was coming to a close.

* * *

 **Mini Chapter 5**

 **The Dragon Lacrima**

"What do you think of this, Bradman?" Irene inquired as she tweaked some final adjustments to smooth, sphere lacrima. Clearly, there was a black flame kindled inside the lacrima.

"It certainly reminds me of the prince," Bradman said, while curiously inspecting the lacrima. "A fire dragon slayer lacrima, imbued with some demonic powers of my touch."

"Indeed. I think this will make a nice welcome back gift, after I clobber him," the Scarlet Despair smiled menacingly.

"You're not actually going to install it in him, right?"

"The emperor forbade me from doing so in the past. No… This is more like an antique."

A certain holder of eight dragon-slayer lacrimas suddenly intruded into the room. "Irene, I am ready for more godly—" God Serena's stopped mid-sentence to stare at the lacrima in awe. "Is that a… Dragon slayer lacrima?"

"It's something more like a demonic dragon slayer lacrima," Irene sighed while narrowing her eyes at the dragon slayer. "Don't you dare touch it!" she hissed.

"Such a thing exists? Where did you get this?" God Serena breathed in would be ecstatic if there was some sort of God Dragon slayer lacrima.

"What do mean? I didn't get it from anywhere. I merely made it myself," Irene glared at God Serena. "Don't underestimate my abilities."

Dots in God Serena's head connected. The prince had once told him that Irene was the founder of dragon slayer magic. He supposed it wouldn't be out of her ability to create lacrimas imbued with dragon slayer magic.

God Serena stood straight up while the room suddenly darkened and a spotlight suddenly shined on him. "Don't you think it would be godly to make a God Dragon slayer lacrima just for me?"

Irene stared at him directly, and clearly said, "No."

"But even I would praise you! Me, a God, praising you!"

"Get out, and continue training. Unless you want me to destroy you," she growled in a menacing tone.

"Ah… right!" God Serena quickly left the room, while trying to think of ways to persuade Irene to make a dragon slayer lacrima for him.

* * *

 **Mini Chapter 6**

 **The Cold**

"Brr…" Neinhart shivered as he hugged himself. It's pretty chilly today, for the summer.

"Are you sure it's not because you're standing next to me?" Invel said, as he stared into the summer night.

"I do not think so… Brr…" he cracked a smile. "Although this kind of does remind me that time when the the prince got a cold."

Invel adjusted his glasses in disbelief, "His highness can't get colds. That's impossible."

"Oh? But do you not remember that time when the prince was stuck in his bed for three days because he was sick?" Neinhart questioned. "I remember, it was a cold winter, and it was the day you froze him top to bottom, because he skipped his private educational lesson. I was the one that had to take care of him…"

" _Neinhart… Am I going to die?" a pale, young Natsu muttered, as the entirety of his body was covered and stacked with blankets. "I mean, I've never gotten sick before, so…"_

" _Do not worry, even if you die, I can conjure you back as a historia."_

" _I don't think I feel better after hearing that…"_

"I remember scrambling around for all sorts of medicine," Neinhart said, while laughing about how much an idiot the prince was, thinking he could die from a cold.

Invel shook his head. "And if I remember correctly, Natsu was just pretending to be sick so he could skip training, and so he could get an excuse to have more hot chocolate," he sighed.

Neinhart sweat-dropped, as he just remembered the torture Irene gave to the prince for faking his sickness. "Oh, right…"

"I don't understand how this cool night reminded you of that," Invel gave him a slightly puzzled look.

"Hmm… I do not know..." Neinhart stared at the sky. "I was just worried for the prince, that is all."

* * *

 **Oh well Mest... I think you're too late :D  
**

 **That's chapter seven. *Takes deep breath* Thank you all for your support, I honestly don't know how I could have made it past chapter 2 without you all. So... as a reward... I gave this chapter a Latin title! Woo! XD (Hope you're not disappointed by that)  
**

 **As usual, beware of my grammar errors and thanks for reading. :P**


	8. Disorder

**Chapter 8**

 **Disorder  
**

 **~Fiore | Dungeons~~~**

 _The old man had just finished a meeting with the Magic Council. It was the usual, "Stop making a mess! Here's a bill!" sort of meeting._

 _Makarov sighed when he read the bill on the sheet of paper they had given him. He would scold his children when he got back. Wanting to cool off from the frustrating meeting, he decided to do some exploring. He hadn't explored in a long time due to him being the third guild master of Fairy Tail._

 _He took a stroll in a forest when he heard crying._

" _Where are you?!" the voice of an innocent child cried. "Igneel!"_

 _Makarov couldn't ignore this distress. He headed toward the source of the crying when suddenly, what appeared to be a black haired teen suddenly appeared in front of him. Dark magic radiated off of the young man._

" _I'm sorry Makarov. But I can't allow you to get further into this forest."_

 _The old man took a defensive stance. "Who are you? How do you know me?"_

 _Black magic started to swirl around the young man._

' _Good Bye,' were the last words Makarov heard before the darkness attacked him and engulfed him._

 _He was sure that he was dead._

 _Until his eyes opened. And his lungs breathed air._

 _He was in the same forest. However, he heard no more crying. And the presence of that young man was gone. Makarov did appear to have nature grow over his body. Removing himself from the forest, the old man went to travel to the nearest town._

 _The town looked different from the night before, but Makarov took no heed to the differences._

 _Until a newsboy yelled 'Extra Extra' and threw many newspapers to the sky. Makarov picked up a newspaper and was only an inch from having a heart attack._

 _First of all, the year that was printed in the newspaper was near x785. He was pretty sure the year was x777, as according to the last time he was conscious._

 _He then saw the headline._ _ **Good Bye Fairies**_

 _The first page was detailed with a horrible accident involving Fairy Tail. The guild was said to be on their S-Class Promotion Exam on Tenrou Island, when suddenly, the Island suddenly disappeared. There had been no trace of it last. The last thing that was seen of it was a large light engulfing the whole island before it had disappeared._

 _Makarov dropped to his knees. He had no idea of what to make of this news, or of why he was suddenly several years into the future._

 _They were all so innocent. Sure, many of them caused him to receive massive amounts of debt, but none of them deserved this cruel fate._

 _He thought this was all a dream, as what he was experiencing felt impossible. But when he woke up the next day, he was still stuck in this nightmare._

 _He didn't know what to do anymore._

 _He thought he should just die right then and there._

 _But then he heard a voice. Surely he was hallucinating if he was starting to hear voices in his mind. But he listened as any other distressed old man would. It told him of the existence of the Eclipse Gate. That he could turn back time and change this fate._

 _It told him this was the only thing he could do to save the lives of his children. He knew messing with time was a bad idea. But this was the only thing he could do._

"I'm so sorry," he closed his eyes and let tears stream down his face. "I shouldn't have let this happen to you all!"

"There was nothing you could have done," Gray growled, not even trying to hide any feelings of resentment toward the old man. "But you could've done something for the rest of the guild! Sure, _we_ were gone, but there were still other members left. You should've came back for them and not continue this door project!"

"Gray," Erza muttered. She would have glared at him for treating the former master with such disrespect, but she too held the angry feelings at the master for abandoning the others. Makarov glanced at Erza, then looked away, knowing how she truly felt.

Macao, the current guildmaster, shivered in the tense atmosphere between Makarov and Gray. "Well, if it makes you feel better, everyone who stayed in the guild felt better since Ivan could no longer assume his role as guild master."

"Until he messed everything up at the Grand Magic Games."

"The old dude's in jail now, along with his lackeys, thanks to Laxus."

"Wish I could have have my share of beating him up, what, especially with how he treated the guild."

"But now, we're all in jail, and we did nothing wrong… except for Makarov, that is."

The rest of the guildmates chimed in, sharing their thoughts about Ivan. The chattering, however, did quickly get out of hand. Makarov yelled, "Quiet!" Everyone was silenced, they still remembered the days when Makarov would silence the whole guild after a huge fight.

Gray sighed, and turned his eyes to the wall. He felt that Makarov had no right to silence everyone like the old days. He wasn't even guild master.

Makarov was saddened by Gray's behavior. He knew it was partly because of Ivan's influence that made Gray act this way.

Erza walked and stood in front of Gray, giving him a look of sympathy. Then she slapped him straight across the face, much to a certain rain woman's displeasure.

"You should give him a second chance," the redhead said.

The ice mage restrained himself from scowling, he didn't want to get beat up by Erza… again.

Makarov silently chuckled at the sight of Gray and Erza. At least some things never changed.

Meanwhile, in the other corner of the cell, Wendy was trying to calm Lucy down. The blonde was about to have a panic attack, but almost no one noticed since everyone was too busy with their 'reunion' with the third guild master.

Lucy hugged her knees, trying to calm down. However, the magic sealing cuffs around her wrist could not stop her from remembering her slave days. Wendy could barely do anything about it. She always relied on her magic to fix things, now that she currently couldn't use her magic… she felt useless.

Suddenly, a voice rose above all voices.

"Hey, Everyone!"

All eyes turned to look at their resident iron dragon slayer.

"I ate the iron bars holding us in here," Gajeel said, while still munching on the leftover scraps of the cell bars. "We should get out of here before the guards come back."

Everyone stood for a second, looking around. Surprisingly, there were no guards around. Never before were they so glad to have Gajeel in their guild.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Palace~~~**

He was assigned to infiltrate Alvarez because he had the magic that allowed him to easily blend in. Not blend in like shapeshift. No, he had the ability to add his existence to the memories of the strangers around him. He could also erase memories, in case of emergency. Like now, with the Prince's unintentional visit to the kingdom of Fiore.

Now, he had finally caught the Prince of Alvarez.

It was incredibly hard to manipulate the memories of those significantly stronger than he was, but the job was possible if they let their guard down and were considerably weakened.

Despite the fact that the prince was unconscious, Mest had to concentrate hard in order to flawlessly erase the memories of this 'kidnapping'. He needed to be calm, completely focused, and have no interruptions.

Clearly, this was a hard job.

Mest flinched, his next obstacle had presented itself to him. The Prince of Alvarez was concerningly pale, and there was blood leaking through the cloth that covered his body. He also realized there was something missing… The prince's scarf was missing. From his days of spying in Alvarez, he quickly learned that that scaly, white scarf was one of the Prince's most prized possession. He clearly couldn't return the Prince in this condition.

As he tried to prevent himself from panicking, an intense shiver was sent through his whole body. He could feel extreme magical presences surrounding the Capital, a total of six presences powerful enough to destroy this whole city if they wanted to. He recognized three of the magical presences belonged to three of the Wizard Saints.

He gulped, and bullets of sweat trickled down his neck. The other three powerful presences belonged to three of the Shields of Alvarez.

It was too late. He couldn't just bring the prince home now. The Shields probably knew that Ishgar, specifically Fiore, had 'taken' the prince.

He then heard a shrilling scream.

"AAAAAAAAH! WHO ARE YOU? WHY IS THERE A GUY DYING ON THE FLOOR? WHAT'S HAPPENING?" it seemed like the princess had awoken.

The guards thrust the doors open, quickly pointing their spears at Mest.

Knowing he had no time to dawdle, he decided the best thing to do was dump the prince in some random bar and hope the Shields don't make a connection with the royal capital with the kidnapping, so he quickly grabbed Natsu as he teleported the hell out of there.

Hisui heavily panted, when suddenly her memories quickly flooded back to her.

"What..?" she lightly touched her wrist. The last thing she remembered was being chased in the Capital of Death. She had no recollection of how she was safely back in the palace, it was as if her imprisonment there had never happened.

A thought suddenly struck her.

"Where's my father?" she demanded of the guards who entered the room.

The guards looked at each other confusedly, then looked at the princess to tell her that they had no recollection of what happened the past few days.

"What's the date today?" she asked.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Palace~~~**

Ever since Happy left the dining room, he had decided to take matters into his own hands. Since Natsu didn't think he could get the princess to release Fairy Tail legally, then all Happy had to do was release Fairy Tail illegally.

He had never done anything illegal in his life, he was curious how it felt like to break the rules.

Every room he entered, he saw guards completely frozen in place. It looked as if they were all just staring into nothingness. It didn't really bother Happy. In fact, he used this as an advantage to freely roam around the palace to find the prison. He actually found it a bit odd that this kingdom put a dungeon inside their own palace.

After much searching, Happy finally found the entrance to the dungeon. Living in a palace with its own types of prisons built within, Happy was somewhat sure that he found the dungeon entrance.

There was a long flight of stairs leading down with small torches dimly lighting the tunnel. Happy didn't mind the darkness, there were sounds coming from below that could help him tell where he should step. Plus, he had wings. Even if he did fall, he could just fall graciously.

The blue exceed eventually did end up slipping on one of the steps, and he very ungraciously fell down the stairs, to the very bottom.

"Ow…" he muttered, while thinking, _at least Carla didn't see that._

As he picked himself up, he suddenly heard a burst of sobs.

"D- don't cry master! If you cry, the- then we'll start crying too!"

These sobs were followed by angry statements, about how they all had to get out of here.

Clearly mistaking those sobs as Carla's cry for help, Happy flew to the source of the sounds. Once he arrived to his destination, he saw a large group of people crying, huddled in the cell area, while there were others outside of the cell, looking for something. He also noticed how there were magic sealing cuffs restraining each of the mages wrists.

The mages all looked stupefied at Happy, while Happy stared dumbly at them. He looked for the white exceed that had captured his heart, but he was interrupted as the group of mages started screaming at him.

Happy screamed too, he didn't know if he was in the middle of a huge prison outbreak, and if all these people were all dangerous mages.

The screams must have snapped the kingdom's guards out of their daze, as a multitude of footsteps running down the stairs to the dungeon room was heard.

One of the prisoners screamed for a key, and the rest of the prisoners scrambled around, desperately looking for a key. Meanwhile, Happy tried to look for Carla.

He found his beloved snow white Exceed standing next to a girl, who he remembered to be Wendy. He leaped toward the female exceed, only to slam into nothing and faceplant the floor when Carla stepped out of his way.

Carla rolled her eyes as Wendy asked, "Happy? What are you doing here?"

Happy didn't respond, he just laughed to himself while drowning in embarrassment. He then noticed the crying blonde who was curled up in the corner of the cell.

As to answer Happy's confusion, Wendy vaguely explained, "She can't handle being imprisoned."

Happy looked around at the hole in the iron bars of the cell and at the panicking mages who looked for a key before the guards arrived. They clearly broke out of prison, meaning that they weren't imprisoned anymore.

"I want to help her…" Wendy cried. "This whole guild has been helping me… Miss Lucy has always been taking care of me. Why can I still do nothing?"

"Wendy…" Carla patted her partner's back.

Happy watched Wendy fidget in her magic sealing cuffs. It was then that he realized that perhaps everyone was just uncomfortable wearing these magic sealing cuffs. He pounded his paws as he just made that realization.

As the screaming of the desperate mages and the dutiful guards started to intensify, Happy reached out to grab Wendy's cuffs. At an instant, his wings vanished.

"What are you—"

"Where I come from, escaping from these little toys is common knowledge," Happy said as he got Wendy out of her handcuffs.

Wendy and Carla gaped at him. Happy quickly realized that he just acted cool in front of his love. His cheeks quickly turned red.

As soon as Happy got the magic sealing cuffs off of Carla, the guards finally arrived to the dungeon floor.

As all the mages thought that they would be forced to a more secure cell, all the guards were all blasted back by a large burst of wind. Everyone turned to Wendy, who somehow got the cuffs off.

Wendy glanced at the blue exceed, indicating that she got out of the cuffs thanks to him.

In a split second, Happy was surrounded by mages, all wanting to get the magic sealing cuffs off of them.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Palace Entrance~~~**

A woman, clad in dark blue and black clothing, stood, without breaking a sweat, before the menacing figures of August, Brandish, and Dimaria.

"Well, this is a surprise," she said, not really showing any surprise or any emotion. "Instead of finding Acnologia, I find three generals from a rival kingdom… Interesting…"

The area surrounding the palace was like a ghost town. It was dead silent. Either, all the citizens were coincedently avoiding this area, or everyone in the area had collapsed due to the extreme levels of Magic emanating from the six mages.

They were all concealing their magic, clearly, or else the entire city would have shut up.

Behind the woman stood two of the Wizard Saints, Hyberion and Wolfheim. Like August, they were old, but not to be underestimated.

"Oh, if only I could just strip this bitch right here and now…" Dimaria muttered, receiving two death glares from her comrades.

"We're not here to fight," August said.

"Really? That's not what it looks like to me," the woman smirked, glancing at Dimaria who was doing everything in her power to not let her emotions get the better of her. "Long time no see, Dimaria."

Brandish stepped in front of said mage, blocking Dimaria's view of the woman, hoping that Dimaria wouldn't make any reckless decisions. She could not help but feel a glare burn at her back.

"Then why are you here?" Wolfheim demanded an answer.

August was not going to discus the matter of their 'kidnapped' prince, at least, not to these people. They would only get the wrong idea about the security of the Alvarez Empire. Plus, to ensure that Zeref would not learn about this little incident, the mission to retrieve the prince would have to be kept a secret, that is, unless this kingdom intended to kidnap the prince in order to instigate war. August didn't see any signs indicating that this kingdom or country wanted to bring war to Alvarez, August decided that the prince's absence from the kingdom was just that of the prince wanting to escape from his princely duties.

"We have business here," he said, without giving any clues as to what their business was.

"Which is?" Hyberion raised an eyebrow.

"That's none of your business," Brandish deadpanned, while noticing how the prince's presence inside the palace had disappeared, and reappeared somewhere else within the city. "We should go now," she said to August.

August nodded, looking at the three Wizard Saints to see if they would allow them to move now.

The woman nodded first, while getting uneasy glances from her companions. The two old men later nodded in approval.

As the Shields walked away, August heard Hyberion say, "What if they're responsible for the burst of Acnologia's magical presence here?"

"Don't worry," the woman said. "They want to kill Acnologia as much as we do, they wouldn't just summon him here to bring destruction."

August shook his head as he wanted to deal with the more pressing matters at the moment. He didn't want to think about their seemingly inevitable clash with the Gods of Ishgar in the future.

"I can't believe it!" Dimaria whispered in a rage. " _That's_ the person who took Serena's spot in the Wizard Saints? How is that even possible?!"

"Calm down," Brandish sighed.

"It's like she's asking for a war between Ishgar and Alvarez!" Dimaria grit her teeth. "I'll have her head next time I see her…"

"I said calm down before I shrink you and put you into an icebox!" Brandish snapped.

August pondered, perhaps that since God Serena's defection, that stupid magic council were too desperate and got _her_ to fill in Serena's spot.

"I just want some star mango gelato when we're done here…" Brandish muttered, cautiously looking back, to look at the woman that made Dimaria so frustrated.

The woman caught her glance and smirked back at her.

* * *

 **~Fiore | Some Random Tavern in Crocus~~~**

"Ughh…" Natsu groaned as his head and body felt like crap. It took minutes for his vision to clear up. He found himself sprawled across the floor, surrounded by some glass and alcohol bottles. He noticed how practically everyone else in the building was unconscious.

He sat up and rubbed his temples with his fingers to help ease what felt like the worst migraine ever. He looked at his surroundings again to make sure he was not just imagining things. Nope, he was still in what seemed like a tavern.

Judging by how he found himself and where he found himself, Natsu guessed that he was involved in some huge drinking party that he had no recollection of going to or even hearing of. But it could only explain how horrible he felt at the current moment.

Natsu sighed, the last thing he could remember was… What was the last thing he could remember?

He suddenly heard voices trying to reach out to him.

" _Natsu?_ Prince Natsu? Can you hear me? Did you drink too much?"

He turned around to find a blonde woman trying to tease him. Behind her stood a green haired woman, roughly the same age as the woman, and a tall old man.

He squinted at the blonde's face. He felt like his headache was getting in his way of recognizing these people. He clutched his head in pain.

"You know we have a lot of taverns in Alvarez, you didn't have to sneak out just to go to a tavern in some other kingdom," the green haired woman sighed.

"Now that you have had your fun," the old man started to talk. "Shall we escort you back home?"

Natsu closed his eyes, trying to reach his deepest thoughts.

"That would be great and all, but…"

The three people glared at him. They were going to bring him home, there was no buts.

"...Who are you people?" Natsu finally got himself to say through the pain.

The trio looked at each other in confusion and concern.

Well, they weren't expecting this.

* * *

 **No 'mini' chapter this time. (I didn't really have any ideas for one)  
**

 **Hope you enjoyed reading this chapter :D**

 **Cool, it's been a year since I released the first chapter of this story. Only on chapter 8 now... Well, that's progress :3**

 **To be'ith continued'th**


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